Wyndham Hotels & Resorts has added Road Trip Planner to its mobile app.
A first-of-its-kind offering from a major hospitality company, the interactive booking tool streamlines the road trip discovery, planning and booking process, allowing travelers to seamlessly plot their next trip in minutes, according to the company.
Road trips became the go-to vacation for families amid the pandemic and continue to be the preferred way to travel for many this summer travel season. In fact, a recent poll by AAA suggests that more than 600 million Americans will be road tripping this summer. Further, recent research commissioned by Wyndham for its American Road Trip Index revealed that while more than 80% of travelers plan to take a road trip this summer, two-thirds (66%) feel overwhelmed by trying to figure out where to stay.
“With thousands of hotels across our country’s highways and byways and 22 iconic brands, there is no company better positioned to help travelers experience the road trip of their dreams,” said Jessica Davidson, SVP, digital, Wyndham Hotels & Resorts. “With Road Trip Planner, travelers enter a few details about the trip and instantly get an itinerary with all their hotel stops, bookable in one single transaction. It’s a huge time saver that not only eases the stresses of travel planning but helps ensure the journey is as enjoyable as the destination.”
Davidson told Hotel Business that the planner not only benefits travelers, but hotels as well. “The goal is really to offer this service that drives those direct bookings into our hotels,” she said. “That’s the value to the owners, but also the value of the loyalty program to our guests. It gives them all the tools they need to make that travel planning easy and seamless so that they can book and stay with us for their road trips in the summer and capture those direct bookings.”
Key to the design is functionality that enables guests to plan, create and book trips that work for them—from the family looking to head out West and visit our nation’s parks this summer, to long-haul truckers regularly making their way up and down the coast.
Davidson added, “Built upon the success and strong adoption of our mobile app, Road Trip Planner is the perfect complement to Lightning Book, which is our ‘Fastest Way to Book Direct,’ and enables guests to reserve a hotel in just a few taps. Now, whatever your travel preferences—be it booking last minute or planning far ahead—Wyndham has you covered.”
Understanding the road tripper mindset
Earlier this month, Wyndham teamed up with Wakefield Research to commission its first-ever American Road Trip Index, uncovering key insights around travelers’ upcoming road trip plans while tapping into pop-culture preferences.
Among some of the top insights from travelers:
- Pete is the popular pick: 56% would choose to road trip with Pete Davidson over Kim Kardashian, with Gen Z (60%), Gen X (58%) and Boomers (58%) leading the charge. For millennials (60%), Kim is still queen.
- Adele rocks the radio: 34% put her at the top of their perfect road trip playlist, followed by Queen (28%), Bon Jovi (26%) and Bruce Springsteen (24%).
- Take away the TV: 59% would sooner give up a month of TV before giving up a week of vacation, with Millennials (67%) and Gen X (66%) being the most eager to trade in their TV remotes.
- Apologies to the in-laws: Asked to pick their top three road trip companions, 93% would rather road trip with someone other than them, including a best friend (58%), a sibling (37%) or even a member of Congress (4%).
- Food is the focus: 1 in 2 (50%) put trying a new restaurant at the top of their road trip travel plans while more than a third (34%) are looking forward to exploring a small town.
- Going the distance: Road trippers plan to travel on average more than 700 miles on their next trip, with more than a quarter (27%) planning to travel 1,000 miles or more.
- Grabbing the wheel: 53% prefer to be the driver over the passenger, with men (73%) overwhelmingly preferring to drive vs. women.