India’s surging middle class is projected to spend as much as $144 billion a year on international travel by 2030. And hotels, airlines and cities are spending millions to land them.
Travel brands have begun heavily courting Indian tourists, often by tapping celebrities as influencers. Bollywood icon Shah Rukh Khan promotes Dubai and Katrina Kaif, a British actress who makes Hindi-language films, professes her loyalty to Accor. Actor Ranveer Singh appears in ads for Abu Dhabi, while his wife, Deepika Padukone, is the global brand ambassador of Qatar Airways. Meanwhile, Neeraj Chopra, the reigning Olympic gold medalist and world champion in javelin, has been enlisted to promote Switzerland’s spectacular alpine landscapes.
With more than 1.4 billion people, India now has the world’s largest population and the fifth-largest economy. Outbound travel from India is growing much faster than from any other country, which has led to a flurry of predictions that have travel brands salivating.
Read the full story on Forbes:
https://www.forbes.com/sites/suzannerowankelleher/2024/03/23/indian-outbound-tourists-international-travel/
0:00 Introduction
0:13 Why Travel Brands Are Betting on Indian Travelers
1:10 Major Indian Celebrities As Travel Brand Ambassadors
1:44 Strengthening International Travel From India
2:36 How The U.S. Can Attract More Travelers from India
3:17 What the Future Holds
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Travel brands have begun heavily courting Indian tourists, often by tapping celebrities as influencers. Bollywood icon Shah Rukh Khan promotes Dubai and Katrina Kaif, a British actress who makes Hindi-language films, professes her loyalty to Accor. Actor Ranveer Singh appears in ads for Abu Dhabi, while his wife, Deepika Padukone, is the global brand ambassador of Qatar Airways. Meanwhile, Neeraj Chopra, the reigning Olympic gold medalist and world champion in javelin, has been enlisted to promote Switzerland’s spectacular alpine landscapes.
With more than 1.4 billion people, India now has the world’s largest population and the fifth-largest economy. Outbound travel from India is growing much faster than from any other country, which has led to a flurry of predictions that have travel brands salivating.
Read the full story on Forbes:
https://www.forbes.com/sites/suzannerowankelleher/2024/03/23/indian-outbound-tourists-international-travel/
0:00 Introduction
0:13 Why Travel Brands Are Betting on Indian Travelers
1:10 Major Indian Celebrities As Travel Brand Ambassadors
1:44 Strengthening International Travel From India
2:36 How The U.S. Can Attract More Travelers from India
3:17 What the Future Holds
Subscribe to FORBES: https://www.youtube.com/user/Forbes?sub_confirmation=1
Fuel your success with Forbes. Gain unlimited access to premium journalism, including breaking news, groundbreaking in-depth reported stories, daily digests and more. Plus, members get a front-row seat at members-only events with leading thinkers and doers, access to premium video that can help you get ahead, an ad-light experience, early access to select products including NFT drops and more:
https://account.forbes.com/membership/?utm_source=youtube&utm_medium=display&utm_campaign=growth_non-sub_paid_subscribe_ytdescript
Stay Connected
Forbes newsletters: https://newsletters.editorial.forbes.com
Forbes on Facebook: http://fb.com/forbes
Forbes Video on Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/forbes
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More From Forbes: http://forbes.com
Forbes covers the intersection of entrepreneurship, wealth, technology, business and lifestyle with a focus on people and success.
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TravelTranscript
00:00 India's surging middle class is projected to spend as much as $144 billion a year on
00:06 international travel by 2030, and hotels, airlines and cities are spending millions
00:11 to land them.
00:13 Recently, more than 3,000 global travel professionals gathered in Delhi for the inaugural Skift
00:18 India Summit, and the opportunity to glean valuable insights from the CEOs of major travel
00:24 brands, including the Oberoi Group, Oyo, Agoda and the country's flag carrier, Air India.
00:31 With more than 1.4 billion people, India now has the world's largest population and the
00:36 fifth largest economy.
00:39 Outbound travel from India is growing much faster than from any other country, which
00:42 has led to a flurry of predictions that have travel brands salivating.
00:46 Euromonitor International projects 47 million Indian outbound travelers by 2030.
00:52 That's more than double the amount from 2019.
00:55 On the spending side, predictions are even more promising, leaping from $35 billion in
01:00 2019 to $84 billion in 2030.
01:04 If these estimates prove accurate, India will become the sixth largest outbound source market
01:08 globally by 2030.
01:11 Given all the hype, travel brands have naturally begun heavily courting Indian tourists, often
01:15 by tapping celebrities as influencers.
01:18 Bollywood icon Chakru Khan promotes Dubai, and Katrina Kaif, a British actress who makes
01:23 Hindi-language films, professes her loyalty to Accor.
01:27 Actor Ranveer Singh appears in ads for Abu Dhabi, while his wife, Deepika Padukone, is
01:32 the global brand ambassador of Qatar Airways.
01:35 Meanwhile, Neeraj Chopra, the reigning Olympic gold medalist and world champion in javelin,
01:40 has been enlisted to promote Switzerland's spectacular alpine landscapes.
01:44 Yet before India's outbound travel can reach its full potential, industry experts say the
01:49 volume of flights in and out of the country, a number mutually decided by the two respective
01:53 governments, must increase dramatically.
01:56 Right now, airlines are operating just 18 scheduled passenger flights each week from
02:00 India to the United States, up from 14 in 2019.
02:05 Some destinations have even made policy tweaks to boost capacity.
02:09 In late 2022, Canada lifted the cap on the number of flights from India from 35 per week
02:14 to unlimited and gave Indian airlines access to six hubs, including Toronto, Montreal,
02:20 Edmonton and Vancouver.
02:22 South African tourism, meanwhile, has teamed up with Ethiopian airlines to provide faster
02:27 links between India and Africa.
02:29 Even Bhutan's prime minister has emphasized the need to strengthen air connectivity between
02:33 India and the tiny Buddhist kingdom.
02:36 Last year, 1.7 million Indian tourists visited the United States, making India the country's
02:41 fourth largest travel source after Canada, Mexico and the United Kingdom.
02:46 The average Indian tourist also spends money while traveling internationally, roughly $5,252
02:52 per trip, according to the last six months of data collected by the National Travel and
02:56 Tourism Office.
02:57 That's nearly double what the typical traveler from the United Kingdom spends.
03:01 If the United States wants to attract more Indian tourists in the future, experts say
03:05 it needs to make entering the country much easier.
03:08 While the U.S. is approving more visas for Indians today than in pre-pandemic years,
03:12 the average visa wait time is still about 10 months, according to the U.S. State Department
03:16 website.
03:17 For the travel industry, India appears to be an economic bright light.
03:20 The country's current 8 percent economic growth rate is stronger than China's.
03:24 Moreover, it shows no signs of slowing down.
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