Bookings of New Year tours in the Baltic States are growing

There has been an increase in sales of Christmas tours in the Baltic countries. According to market participants, working on the destination, the number of bookings has increased by an average of 10%, compared with the same period of 2017. The depth of sales has also grown - it is already over 2.5 months. In the top demand are trips to Estonia, also as part of combined tours to the Baltic countries. “Trips for celebration the New Year in Tallinn are well-booked. All the tours for the New Year holidays are almost fully booked. On some proposals our growth of sales reaches +40%,” said Sergey Tolchin, the executive director of Intourist tour operator. According to him, for holiday dates both bus tours with departure from St. Petersburg and railway tours are in demand. On the second position are trips to Latvia, noted in the network of travel agencies "MGP". The company confirmed the increase in the number of bookings to the Baltic countries as a whole (within 5–7%). At the same time, they clarified that Riga retains its position of the last year, despite a significant increase of the average price for holidays - from 29,979 Rubles (399 Euros) last year to 46 535 Rubles (619 Euros) this year. Lithuania is on the third position in the number of bookings for New Year’s dates. According to observers, Russian tourists are showing more interest for the Baltic countries, because against the background of a weaker ruble such trips look better than other European destinations: there is no urgent need to buy tours with air flights and the cost of living in hotels is lower. Therefore, those who went on holidays last year, for example - to the Czech Republic, could choose more budgetary Estonia. A significant share on the destination is occupied by independent travelers. In the absence of problems with the language barrier, many tourists book rooms in the Internet and buy tickets for buses and trains or organize a trip by private car. Therefore, it is difficult to predict the total tourist flow from the Russian Federation, the picture, according to statistics, will become more complete after the holidays.