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Sustainable Travel with Madeline List

• Jeff Borman and Matt Brown

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How big of a factor is sustainability when U.S. travelers choose where to go? Who do they think should be responsible for addressing cultural and economic sustainability challenges? How much does a crowded versus uncrowded destination matter when tourists make decisions on where to go?  We will definitely, absolutely find out with Madeline List, a Senior Research Analyst with Phocuswright and the author of the report Beyond Climate Change: Cultural and Economic Sustainability in Travel.

https://www.phocuswright.com/Travel-Research/Consumer-Trends/Beyond-Climate-Change-Cultural-and-Economic-Sustainability-in-Travel

Matt Brown:

Hi everybody, welcome again to no Show. I'm Matt Brown, joined as always by Jeff Borman. Our guest today, madeline List, is senior research analyst with Focusrite, a leading authority in travel, tourism and hospitality market research. Madeline writes about many subjects related to travel short-term rentals over tourism, how social media influences trip planning. We love talking about all those things and do often on this show, and her most recent report, which we'll talk about today, is called Beyond Climate Change Cultural and Economic Sustainability in Travel. Madeline is a world traveler, speaker of many languages, new York City resident, lover of wine, circus school trainee, randomized graduate, child of Maryland and an all-around delightful person. Madeline, welcome to no Show.

Madeline List:

Thank you so much for having me. I appreciate that level of internet stalking.

Matt Brown:

You're welcome. It's our specialty. Let's begin at the beginning. How did this study come to be and how did you gather the information that went into it?

Madeline List:

Sustainability is obviously not a new topic that we're speaking about in the travel industry.

Madeline List:

It's been a hot issue and, quite frankly, a bit of a buzzword for many years now.

Madeline List:

But what inspired this specific study was the fact that we saw a lot of data gathered, a lot of research published, including from some of our own studies that really suggested that consumers were going to rally very strongly behind sustainable travel options and be making radically more sustainable travel decisions in the future.

Madeline List:

And that's one thing when you initially collect that information.

Madeline List:

But as time passes and as you watch that play out, we noticed that there were a lot of sustainable choices that really weren't taking off, that people weren't behaving consistently with the intentions that they had expressed in the studies.

Madeline List:

So that really sparked a question for us as researchers to say why is there such a discrepancy, why are there inconsistencies between what people report that they're going to do in these studies and the way that they're actually behaving when it comes to choosing what they want to do on their trips, choosing destinations, hospitality options, etc. So we designed a study that was a bit different than what we had seen elsewhere in the space, and one of the things that made this different is that we did a survey of travelers in the US and in five different markets in Europe in the UK, in Germany, in France, in Italy and in Spain where the first half of the survey was actually blinded and we did not disclose that we were going to be collecting information about sustainability. Our goal was to get a lot of information about people's travel behaviors and how they made travel decisions, without anything in there that would bias the respondents to maybe claim that they were more focused on sustainability than they actually were.

Madeline List:

And then when we revealed the topic of the study and that there was going to be more of a focus on sustainability, we really didn't want to skip any logical steps in how we were collecting information.

Madeline List:

So, for instance, one of the big questions on our minds as researchers was do people understand what sustainability in travel means?

Madeline List:

We have industry definitions that we speak about, but if consumers don't understand the industry definition, if they're not in line with it, then every time they make some sort of claim that says something like I plan to travel more sustainably in the future, we could be speaking to completely different languages in terms of what we're even referring to, and that could account for part of the discrepancy.

Madeline List:

So we collected information about what aspects of sustainable travel people were aware of, if they thought it was their job or their personal responsibility to make more sustainable decisions, and then we got deeper into more attitudes about what sustainable travel represented to them and intentions for the future, and what this revealed was that there was indeed a lot of inconsistency between people's beliefs about themselves, beliefs about the world, and their actual behaviors, their actual choices to be more sustainable. It wasn't quite as rosy or quite as optimistic as some of the other studies that we'd seen published about sustainability, but it really did start to get at some of the harder questions about why the good intentions we had seen published before simply weren't playing out in the travel landscape.

Matt Brown:

As you mentioned, sustainability is now such a broad term. Companies often use it, I think, to add a coat of paint onto their practices. How do you define sustainability?

Madeline List:

We had a relatively holistic definition of sustainability. Moving into this, I would say that overall sustainable practices are ones that can be done or executed in perpetuity without affecting the livability or the visitability of destinations. And those practices kind of fall into three main categories for the purposes of our study. One are the classical environmental aspects of sustainability that often come to mind first when people hear the word or they think about the topic Recycling, resource management, pollution management. The second has to do with overtourism and dispersal, crowd management. And then the third has to do with sustainability that relates to economic or cultural sustainability. Can people who are from a destination still afford to live there? Are they earning good money from tourism jobs? Is the tourism model in a place economically viable there for years to come?

Jeff Borman:

How big a factor is sustainability when US travelers very important right Are making choices about where to go? You mentioned all the different ways travelers define sustainability, individually and differently. So then, on balance, how big a factor is it?

Madeline List:

The short answer is that it depends, and then the long answer is that it can really depend on how much sustainability affects people's trips. I think it's important to take into account that for sustainable practices around travel, there are a lot of people who aren't traveling very often, and so they don't look at sustainable travel decisions the same way that they might look at sustainability decisions for their day to day lives, because they don't always feel like their travel decisions make that much of an impact. Of course, for destinations that have a lot of tourists, they are very aware of the fact that even the people who are taking one or two leisure trips a year still are collectively very impactful on them. But I think it's important to consider that for travelers, it's difficult to think about the cumulative impact of their actions when they're really only taking a trip a couple times a year, and for a lot of people in the US travel market, that is how often they're going But— I think that it's also this sounds a little bit contradictory to come in and say this as a sustainability researcher, but if you are any sort of travel supplier or your destination that's doing things sustainably, when you think about how to push this in your marketing. It really can't be the leading factor, because people are always going to think about their core needs first. Sustainability is not going to surpass, for example, if we're talking about a hospitality decision. It's not going to surpass location. It's not going to surpass rice. It's not going to surpass basic amenities in terms of how people make their decisions. Once a lot of other things are accounted for, it might play in, but you really can't lead with that in the marketing if you're looking for a lot of conversions because people need their core needs met first.

Madeline List:

And then the other thing I would encourage people to take into account is the fact that, for better or for worse, people are going to care more about sustainability if the lack thereof affects their own travel experiences. So one of the areas where I see sustainability being considered more has to do with crowding or with overtourism. Crowds bother people. Or if there is a problem with certain resource management, like if there's trash buildup, if there's litter, people are going to notice something like that. It's going to directly affect their leisure travel, their vacation experience, for things that are happening a little more behind the scenes. They're just not going to take that into account as much. Because, at the end of the day, as altruistic as people would like to believe that they are, they're most responsive to the things that directly affect their trips, and that really punts a lot back to the industry in terms of who's going to manage it, because a lot of times, it's not going to affect the consumer decisions if it's not actively damaging their experiences.

Madeline List:

One of the interesting things about the consumer view on sustainability, though, is that they tend to believe that sustainable options are going to be more expensive, and while I applaud any sort of luxury tier travel suppliers who have managed to really successfully integrate sustainability into their value proposition, I think it's created a problem when the general travel population feels that you need to be wealthy in order to make sustainable decisions, or that sustainable decisions need to be a splurge.

Madeline List:

A decision like I mean even something as simple as bringing a reusable water bottle, but some decisions like going to a place that's less crowded, because you're looking for both a more enjoyable experience but also will support another place that doesn't have as much tourism and will divert some crowds away from some busy areas. That's not necessarily more expensive, and it can actually be cheaper in certain scenarios. Same with certain decisions about buying local or staying in locally owned hotels. That's not necessarily more expensive than other options. But part of the issue is the average consumer. When they hear the word sustainability in travel, their mind goes to that association that sustainability is going to be in a higher price tag, and I think that's something that we need to overcome as an industry with consumer education, because it's not necessarily true and it holds back people who aren't luxury consumers from thinking that they can make more sustainable and more green decisions.

Matt Brown:

A resident sustainability image that sticks with people is one of over tourism, which you've written about. A lot Pictures of crowds in Venice, packed trails at Yosemite, and on and on and on. How much does a crowded versus uncrowded destination really matter when tourists make decisions on where to go?

Madeline List:

I think part of the issue that we face on that is that, while crowds do bother people, there isn't currently a lot of really transparent information about, A how crowded people can expect places to be when they book a trip there and, B where they can go instead and what the alternative options are. Frankly, until we get a lot of marketing materials that are really going to push transparency around expectations, around crowds and about alternatives, I think it's going to be very challenging for hordes of people to really make different decisions, even if crowds bother them. They need that information and they need the transparency they needed early on in the trip planning process.

Jeff Borman:

One of my favorite examples. When we talk about overcrowding and the sustainability of these certain venues like UNESCO, world Heritage venues like Machu Picchu, there are too many people. I've been there twice, which is probably a problem Everybody should get one but at the top you look around with hordes and hordes of people and you realize that this place that is so special that people come from all around the world to visit really is being deteriorated. The steps are falling in, the buildings are starting to wobble a bit. There's a real damage.

Madeline List:

They weren't designed for that many people to come through.

Jeff Borman:

No, no. In any given day there are seven to eight times the number of people who was meant to even house, Not to mention just the wear and tear. I could go on all day. But where I come and I'd love your take on this, because I love that you talk about sustainability, not just from the environmental impact but from the cultural impact is that the people who go to Aguascalientes in Peru, they spend their money, and these are real dollars that matter to real Peruvians. Whether they're hawking their wares in the bottom of the hill or offering services at the Belmont Hotel at the very top for $900 a night, doesn't matter. Those dollars are going to real Peruvians who need it the most. How do you balance that?

Madeline List:

I think that what I'm advocating for is not really for people to stop traveling. I'm not telling people don't go to Peru. It's more of a consideration of where you're going to go in the country, how you're going to spend your time and how you're going to design your itinerary. Peru is actually a great example, because I've heard from a lot of people that as wonderful as Machu Picchu is, there are a lot of lesser lauded spots or less famous spots that have been major highlights for tourists and many people just don't have that hyped up for them in advance. It's not hyped up as much through marketing or through social media. They don't understand until they arrive at other sites and other attractions how fantastic they are.

Madeline List:

That, to me, is a big part of the issue that the tourism traffic it's too concentrated and you get problems where you have certain people who are going all to the famous places and not to the non-famous places and that leaves one destination absolutely flooded and sometimes neighboring destinations who are shockingly close actually kind of really looking for tourists and on the hunt for them. It's fascinating how sometimes tourism can be incredibly contained even within something as simple as a city block, that sometimes people just don't move beyond certain very contained areas. Sometimes it's a city block, sometimes it's a neighborhood, sometimes it's to a neighboring city or a village. But I think spreading it out and really dispersing effectively and dispersing to places that want the tourism is critical here, because the country of Peru is really quite big. It's Machu Picchu that's struggling. There's enough space in Peru as an entire travel market to hold the number of tourists that are coming there. The issue is when they all funnel into the exact same places.

Matt Brown:

Another interesting point that you make is that, while travelers prefer that their money benefits local people, they don't really feel like they have to ensure that that happens. They feel that lies with the government or private enterprise, or the hotel will take care of it. It's a classic response and, I think, one that we're all pretty used to. It's like I'm on vacation. The point is, I don't have to worry about anything. How do you think countries and tourism areas and private enterprise should bridge that gap? What do you think is next to get us into a space where we start thinking a little bit about our impact on where we go?

Madeline List:

Well, I will always be a proponent of consumer education and trying to equip consumers with information about what the right decision is when that's possible.

Madeline List:

Sometimes that's as simple as labeling, because so many options that are more sustainable or that benefit the local community more directly just aren't labeled effectively.

Madeline List:

In that search and that shopping process, that's a really easy place to draw more people in.

Madeline List:

I think this becomes a really complex issue that needs to go beyond the individual consumer's decisions, because once you hand over that credit card or once you hand over your cash, it is very unclear where the money goes after you spend it, and I think that's a big source for a big fuel for the fire for why consumers feel like it's not their job to ensure that money benefits the local community or that money stays there.

Madeline List:

Because, frankly, tracking where your money is going after you spend it is a headache and it's quite difficult. And, as someone who both travels and is in the industry, when I ask questions about this, I often find myself in confusing places or I find myself in dead ends, understanding who owns what and when there's a local owner, when they're not, when there might be something corrupt happening, etc. And it gets us to a place, ultimately, where I don't know if the consumer can be fully responsible for this, just because the level of transparency around the flow of money within a destination is so low that, eventually, to solve this effectively, other parties would need to come in to ensure that money stays within the local community, because the tourist, just frankly, isn't equipped with the resources to ensure that for themselves.

Jeff Borman:

One of the things in your article that I think there was a graph that really kind of spoke to me and spoke to me in what I do professionally too in the hotel world is the graph was consider buying local form of stable travel in a few different sectors, right. So there was food, buying souvenirs, strategically staying at local hotels.

Madeline List:

They love local food.

Jeff Borman:

It was all food. You're right, it's exactly what it was. Double anything else is all about food. What I took from that was two things First, that that's what we need to put forward as an industry when we talk about cultural sustainability. That should be at the front of the narrative. And the other one was the one that ranked least among those was using locally owned tour agencies, and I thought big mess, what a huge opportunity for again sticking with our Peruvian example. Since that's where we kind of took this conversation. Why are we not focused on making sure that the person who guides me is fluent in Quechua, right? Like maybe that's my parameter to make sure that this dollar and this employee actually goes to somebody where it really makes the difference? I hope it does.

Madeline List:

I think with food, it helps that there's been more publicity around sustainability of food options and again that goes back to ideas of there's more sustainable.

Madeline List:

There's more sustainability promotion around things that people do every day and people eat every day, so there's a lot more information out there around what food and beverage sustainable decisions are. But one of the things that I really took away when that data came back was that, as important as food is and I love the idea that people are down to support local restaurants, local bars, things that are locally sourced, things that come from local purveyors but that's just not as big of a ticket amount, it's not as big of a purchase as a lot of these tour and activity or a lot of these hospitality decisions. And that's a real missed opportunity because it means that a lot of the places where people are frankly just spending more money are not considered areas where people realize they can make a more sustainable decision. So that's a big problem to solve for when the real money is in other categories that people don't realize can be more sustainable than they are right now.

Matt Brown:

Were there any other numbers or findings that genuinely surprised you?

Madeline List:

I think that it was very interesting for me to see that that, despite a lot of public perception, travelers in Europe did not seem all that more aware of what sustainable travel meant than travelers in the US. There's definitely a stereotype that Europe is much more sustainable and the market is much more sustainability forward. And, granted, this was only a travel study exclusively. This was not looking at awareness of how to make more sustainable decisions in day to day life, and had we conducted that, we may have seen big market differences between the US and Europe, but when it comes to awareness of what sustainable travel really means and when we look at who is really making more sustainable decisions, the differences between US and the European markets were actually pretty minor, and that really countered a major public narrative that we had seen about market differences.

Matt Brown:

It's time for the mystery question. This one comes from Jeff. Jeff, take it away.

Jeff Borman:

I have a difficult question for you because it doesn't just probe into research. This is a personal opinion, but if you've got any real good fact and thought, I'd love to hear it. Should there be non-scientific travel allowed to Antarctica?

Madeline List:

Oof.

Madeline List:

I know this is very relevant, especially if you isn't there a treaty that's ending around tourism to Antarctica soon.

Madeline List:

It was such a huge market post-COVID when everyone was going on these trips that were there their bucket list that they couldn't go on when the market was shut down.

Madeline List:

I think that when it's done properly and when the industry is able to reach really strong agreements around this, it's a great source of both consumer education about how to travel sustainably because I know that on a lot of these excursions they really educate people a lot about how to be careful about the environment and the measures that the cruise ships take and also a big source of inspiration for people to look at how we treat the planet differently. I think there's a way in which it can really have benefit, but it has to be done well, because if we have it be open season for people to go to these delicate environments, just the damage that can be done can be extensive. I don't like to say always or never with these types of things, but I think there could certainly be a wrong way for Antarctic tourism to develop in the future. That's something I definitely think about. I was in Argentina, in Patagonia also the Chilean side of Patagonia at the end of 2022, and there were quite a few people who were heading down there.

Matt Brown:

If it opened up, would you go?

Madeline List:

I have a fear of the Drake Passage personally. The idea of just being rocked around for three days straight on the way there and on the way back. It seems nauseating to think about it. But I have to say it's been on my list because I finished visiting every inhabited continent actually on my 22nd birthday, and then Antarctica just looms there when you check the other six, often not checked off in the sense that I'm done seeing other continents, but when there's one more continent left to set foot on it is tempting.

Jeff Borman:

It makes me think that the movie the Bucket List was the worst thing to ever happen to tourism.

Madeline List:

I have so many thoughts about that because I think FOMO culture has been very damaging.

Madeline List:

Now there was probably a time in tourism marketing where the FOMO push or to push people to feel like, if they didn't see something before they died, that they were doing life wrong or they were doing travel wrong.

Madeline List:

When the tourism numbers were lower overall, that was probably a really helpful way of encouraging visitation and encouraging people to have a little bit more fire under them to see places. But now, when you have travel as something that's so much more accessible and the world's population just keeps on growing, pushing people to feel like if they don't see certain places before they die, they're somehow doing life wrong, it's just causing crowds, it's causing a lot of difficulty in certain places and, frankly, it doesn't make everyone happy, because a lot of these amazing places are only amazing for the people who can appreciate them and feel interest in them and have a sense of what their significance or their history or their beauty or their nature actually means. But I'm an advocate of people doing trips that they actually enjoy, because I think that when we encourage people to go to a place just to check it off the bucket list, you wind up with dissatisfied travelers and crowded places. It just turns into a lose-lose situation for both parties.

Matt Brown:

Matt on the list, come back soon. Thank you so much for being a guest.

Madeline List:

Thank you.