Glasgow’s Commonwealth Games crowd is young, family-first – and ready to spend
The Commonwealth Games return to Glasgow on 23 July and the fans planning to travel for them look very different to your average UK visitor.
With the Games now just weeks away, the travelling audience is taking shape – and it’s a segment any European destination, hotel group or rights holder should want to understand. So we turned to our consumer travel tracker TACTIQ to profile the fans intending to make the trip.
TACTIQ collects data from international travellers (rather than the general public) in 12 markets. For this piece we’ve put together data from the three members of the Commonwealth within this sample – the UK, Canada and India – and looked at those who told us they were planning to attend the Commonwealth Games. Unless specified otherwise, comparisons are against past UK leisure visitors who are not considering visiting the Commonwealth Games.
A conversion window that’s still wide open
Here’s the commercial headline. Half of this audience expect to book their next holiday within three months, while just 24% have already booked – fewer than ordinary UK visitors from the same markets (32%). In other words, a larger share of these high-value travellers are still deciding where to go. The window to influence them is open now.
Younger, more affluent, and rarely travelling alone
Our Commonwealth intenders are a notably young crowd. More than three-quarters (76%) are aged 18-44, with a sizeable 25-34 cohort (32%) – skewing younger than UK visitors as a whole. They are also far more likely to have a family: 79% have children in the household, against 54% of typical UK visitors. As a result they are more likely to travel with family – half (50%) holidayed with their children on their last main trip (vs 39%), while a quarter travelled with friends (vs. 15% of typical visitors).
They have the means to match. Around 77% sit in the medium-to-high income bracket, with the high-income share well ahead of typical UK visitors from these markets (32% vs. 21%).
Luxury-leaning, and hungry for more than the sport
These tourists are worth pitching to: 36% plan 5-7 nights and a further 28% plan 8-10 days. What’s more, they are twice as likely as UK visitors to choose luxury, top-tier accommodation (30% vs. 15%). Among the major brands, Marriott leads (22%), with Hilton close behind (19%).
As usual with travellers taking in a sports event on a trip, sport is only part of the appeal. On trips built around watching professional sport, this audience also seeks out culture (48%), relaxation (48%) and adventure (45%). Nightlife matters more to them than to other UK visitors (44% vs. 33%), as do special events and fan zones (39% vs. 26%) – a clear signal that experiences around the venues can extend the spend well beyond the ticket. That’s not always the case for some sports travellers but is obviously a more appealing prospect for Commonwealth intenders.
Restaurants (54%), live music (42%) and lighter “fun” experiences such as theme parks and mini golf (46% vs 33%) all feature too.
Not a one-event crowd
Crucially, this isn’t an audience that surfaces for a single Games and disappears. Beyond the Commonwealth Games, this audience follows cricket (62%), tennis (61%), F1 (59%), basketball (56%), athletics (50%) and badminton (47%) – all comfortably above typical UK visitor benchmarks.
In addition, they’ve already proven they’ll travel for sport: 30% have come to the UK to watch sport in the last three years, suggesting that marketing efforts to capture this audience for the Commonwealths could also pay off for return visits.
The Games are weeks away, but the booking decisions are happening now. For the full picture of who’s travelling, what moves them and which channels reach them, get in touch – or see what TACTIQ can reveal about your audience.
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