US $600.00

PhoCusWright's Italian Online Travel Overview

July 2007
USD $600 CAD $612 GBP £303 EUR €382

With over 8,000 kilometers of coast, 300 small islands, a sizable portion of the world’s art heritage and the most elaborate and extensive ancient history in the West, Italy deserves its distinction as one of the most visited countries in the world (trailing the U.S., Spain and France and followed by Germany and the U.K.). Still, Italy has not approached its online travel potential.

With a population of over 58 million people, Italy represents the sixth largest market in terms of expenditure for outbound travel after Germany, the U.S., U.K., Japan and France, according to the Italian Foreign Exchange Office (UIC, or Ufficio Italiano dei Cambi). In terms of expenditures by inbound travelers, Italy trails Spain and France.

Germans represent an important part of the inbound traffic, comprising more than one in five visitors, followed by the U.S., France and the U.K., all with half or less that share. The dominant purpose of this inbound travel was leisure (65% in 2006).

Report Overview Table of Contents Methodology

REPORT OVERVIEW ^top

Providing guidance in the highly fragmented European market.
PhoCusWright’s latest in-depth look at market size, forecasts and analysis for the European market as a whole along with the Italian travel market and online travel markets for the years 2004-2006 (actual) and 2007-2008 (projected), by segment and channel.

Get informed about the local players and their importance in each of the market segments.
Along with channel analysis of European and Italian online travel agency, tour operator and supplier direct sales, PhoCusWright’s Italian Online Travel Overview provides segment analyses (including historical and projected segment gross bookings and growth, both online and offline) for:

Airline
Hotel
Car Rental
Rail
Packaging

TABLE OF CONTENTS ^top

The European Online Travel Marketplace
Introduction
Europe Market Assumptions
Growth Factors
Trends in European Online Corporate Travel
Conclusions

The Italian Online Travel Marketplace
Overview
Internet Penetration and E-Commerce
Size of the Market
Online Travel Agencies
Suppliers
Conclusion

METHODOLOGY ^top

PhoCusWright's Italian Online Travel Overview presents the findings from PhoCusWright research on the European online travel markets in 2006 and 2007. This effort was undertaken as a multi-part project to assess the European travel market as a whole with in-depth analyses of five individual European markets: France, Germany, the U.K., Italy and Spain. These comprise the third edition of PhoCusWright's European market research, and this report covers overall European market trends.

To evaluate the markets, PhoCusWright interviewed executives from over 100 European-based airlines, hotels, tour operators, rail companies, online travel agencies, traditional travel agencies and travel technology companies. European estimates and projections include the first 15 European Union (EU) countries as well as Norway and Switzerland.

Internet sales are based on gross bookings – that is, the total transaction value of the products sold online – for leisure and unmanaged business travel sites (i.e., consumer-facing Web sites that sell to individuals, including unmanaged business travelers purchasing outside of corporate travel policies). PhoCusWright includes in these figures bookings that are researched online but may have been completed offline as a direct result.

All financial information is based on data obtained from interviews with company executives or publicly available financial reports. Estimates and projections are based on executive interviews, third party information, Web traffic results, economic indicators, market trends and PhoCusWright analysis.

PhoCusWright market size estimates and projections are based on the local market results of pan-European online travel agencies, the results of local online travel agencies, and total gross sales reported by local suppliers. Data is actual for 2004-2006 and projected for 2007-2008.

Non-hospitality suppliers’ online sales are assigned to the market in which the supplier is headquartered. For example, all online business generated by Lufthansa worldwide is associated with Germany, while all Air France online revenue is associated with France. Hospitality suppliers' gross bookings are based on revenues generated by properties in the country source market. Room revenue for hotels and guesthouse/bed and breakfast establishments are included.

All currencies are in European euros (€) converted at the average rate for the period they represent. References to the “travel market” are understood to cover the total travel market, and “traditional travel agency” refers to principally offline travel agencies.