A survey conducted by Travel Leaders Group reveals London as the number one ranking international destination for American travellers for winter 2016. This is the first time London has claimed the number one spot and is an improvement from 2015 when it placed in third position.
The Fall Travel Survey, conducted by America’s largest travel agency company, was carried out from July 28 to August 24 and recorded responses from 1,145 US-based travel agencies. The people surveyed were agency owners, managers and frontline travel agents and affiliates of the Travel Readers brand.
CEO for Travel Readers Group, Ninan Chacko, stated that the Brexit vote and the consequential drop in the value of the British pound is believed to be the reason for London’s favourable survey outcome. He also added that although London has always been among their top ranking destinations, the survey proves that travellers are adaptable to places that have increased value.
Additional findings revealed that 45% of those surveyed found that the increased value of the US dollar against the British pound peaked their clients’ interest for travel to countries within the United Kingdom. In addition, the survey showed that despite security-related incidents, half of the destinations ranked in the top ten are European cities.
After London, Cruise to the Caribbean came in second while Cancun in Mexico took this year’s third place. Rome, Italy and Paris, France rounded out the top five most popular destinations for clients of the Travel Readers Group’s nationwide Fall Travel Survey.