It seems that COVID 19 uncertainty will still mine the travel industry recovery, in the short run. Expectations are that international travelling is moving to mid-2021, with an over-loss of -80% if compared with 2019.

Nevertheless, this is a global problem, which solutions can only be local. Considering that nobody can forecast exactly when and how international travelling will come to life again, some countries are exploring new paths and investigating new markets.

China is giving some clues, which may help to lead the change in travel marketing and sales:

1. Domestic travel market is growing fast, with an increase from 30 to 50% in parks and open-air destinations. This means that museums, theatres, art cities in general will be asked to re-think their approach to tourists….

Even though the internet may help, the emotional expectation which motivates a travel dream will never die. Think of Venice, Florence or Rome: crowds and floods of tourists disappear because of the physical distancing; severe entrance measures (pay to enter the city, not only the museum premises) will be adopted, causing an earthquake in local economy;

• Travelers are young with low spending budgets. Millennials, especially, do believe in the green approach to a ‘new normality’, which highlights as fundamental in the ‘new-normal’.
• Social media are becoming the only effective tool for vertical and horizontal marketing strategies.

What these facts mean for countries where the travel industry and the catering sector live on small scale business?

How long will they survive, considering their limited financial resources and the obstacles they meet to access to capital credits?

Think of Italy, severely struck by covid. Small firms, excellent restaurants, hospitable farms and beautiful hotels plunged into a huge amount of culture and natural attractiveness.

What will happen to one of the first destination in the world travel wish-list? How will Italy conserve and share its heritage, in the future?

If the pandemic is not fought back by the end of 2020, Italy is expected to take urgent measures to help small hoteliers and caterers not to disappear and causing a huge loss in terms of cultural heritage.

The hottest question is: how and which criteria may be adopted to prevent that loss?

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