Brits' Blueprint for the Perfect Summer Holiday Revealed

It’s all about cultural immersion, local knowledge and authentic experiences.

This summer you can forget tan lines, forging friends with other Brits and Facebooking contrived holiday snaps by the pool – because the single most important thing for 70 per cent of Brits to takeaway from their summer holiday is an increased understanding of the country they’ve visited.

This insightful revelation is part of Homestay.com’s new blueprint for Brits’ perfect summer holiday, that rips up the rule book and challenges the archetypal view of what Brits are looking for from an ideal getaway.

According to research from Homestay.com, the online marketplace for hosted accommodation, Brits’ perfect holiday is now no more than a 10 day voyage of discovery, visiting an average of five local attractions and trying six local dishes or drinks. 40 per cent are choosing to shun social media completely and only one in 10 (14 per cent) want to befriend a Brit whilst away, rather than socialising with the locals. And whilst we used to assume everyone abroad could speak English, three-quarters of Brits (75 per cent) are now keen to learn up to 15 phrases in the local lingo rather than use the British mother-tongue.

Alan Clarke, CEO for Homestay.com said: “The research clearly shows how much our priorities have changed when it comes to our summer holidays. Millions of Brits now want to explore the country they’re visiting and really learn about their destination, as opposed to just lounging by the pool and topping up their tans. There’s no better way to do this than through a homestay, where you can truly get under the skin of the place you’re visiting by staying in real people’s homes with them, getting an ‘insiders scoop’ and seeing somewhere through a local lens.”

A homestay can be defined as staying in the home of a local while they are there. The homestay model transforms the guest experience from ‘visit’ to ‘live it’. There are 15,000 Homestay.com hosts around the globe, based in 130 different countries. Guests have booked more than 100,000 nights on Homestay.com to date.

About Homestay.com

Launched in 2013, Homestay.com provides an established global community with the digital marketplace for accommodation called homestays - staying in the home of a local while they are there.  The fact that the ‘host is always present’ sets Homestay.com apart from its competitors as it transforms the guest experience from ‘visit’ to ‘live it’, recognising the importance of people (guest and host) in making homestay experiences. Moving this globally known and long-standing offline industry online, Homestay.com provides a frictionless digital interface to connect guests with their ideal homestay host. To this end, it is a leading player in the emerging ‘shared experience’ economy.

Homestay.com has also pioneered the “pop-up” homestay network, designed to solve acute accommodation shortages, mitigating price rises, and to help local communities benefit from large-scale local events. Homestay.com is a limited company and has raised venture capital funding through Delta Partners Ltd. Homestay.com chairman is Paddy Holahan, the founder and CEO of Newbay, and former Chairman of Hostelworld. CEO is Alan Clarke, formerly of Yahoo!, McKinsey and Company and Paddypower.


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