Research of Interhome (a Swiss rental-home company) gives us insight in the booking behaviour of Dutch consumers. One of the things that is interesting is that there is a significant difference between bookings in December and February. Bookings for February are made one year in advance, while bookings for Christmas holidays are made six months in advance.

Most bookings are made in March, these are the bookings for February/March the next year. In the figure below you can see the amount of bookings set aside against the time that the booking is made in advance. The blue line shows bookings for December, orange is for bookings in January, brown for February and yellow for March. As you can see, 40% of the Dutch consumers book one year in advance for February, against 35%.

Early booking appears to be popular. Not surprising, because you often get “early booking discount.” In addition, the advantage is that there is a lot of choice when it comes to accommodations. The disadvantage is that you do not know how the slopes will look like in a year.

Based on figures of the last three years, Interhome researched the travel behaviour of Dutch consumers compared to other Europeans. As you can see below, 50% of the Dutch go on winter sport vacation in February. Other Europeans are more divided over the four most popular months. In general, the weeks around Christmas and around February/March are the most popular for all European winter sport people. 

The infographic above shows us that week 2, 7, 11 and 14 are the best weeks to go on winter sport if you don’t want it to be busy. So if you don’t mind a little bit of cold, week 2 and 7 are the best weeks for you. But if you prefer to have sun during the holiday? You should go in March.

Would you like to know how you can generate more bookings in winter to your destination? Feel free to contact one of our online specialists!

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