Market News

Beach destinations hit the records

Spain: Spain registered a 60% increase in visas issued to Russians during the first 10 months of 2010, compared to the previous year. In October alone, according to Tour Espana, 18,000 Spanish visas were issued, which was 54% more than in September. However, these figures are still 26% lower than the benchmark 2008. In total, out of over 233,000 Russians who visited Spain in the first half of 2010, 54% traveled to Catalonia, 13% went to Madrid, and 12% visited the Canary Islands.

Israel: According to the Israel Ministry of Tourism, in October 2010, 72,000 Russians visited the country, a 24% increase on the figures for last October. This makes Russia the leading source market for Israel, followed by the USA. A total of 450,000 Russians visited Israel since Jan 2010, which has become a visa free destination for Russians since 2008.

Croatia saw a 35% increase in arrivals from Russia from Jan - Sept 2010, compared with 2009, with 160,000 Russians visiting Croatia during the first 9 months of this year.

Chinese Tropical Island over 100,000 Russians visited China's tropical resort of Hainan during the first 9 months of 2010, according to the China Hospitality News. This is a substantial increase, in numbers from 2009. This destination is particularly popular with Russians living in Siberian and the Far East parts of Russia, due to the geographical proximity.

Cuba had over a 30% increase in Russian arrivals from January to September 2010, compared to last year. According to the National Statistics Body, over 35,500 Russians visited Cuba and in September alone, the number of Russian visitors doubled compared to September 2009, thus 4,800 visitors against 2,300 in the previous year. Today, Russia is the 9th largest source market for Cuba, which is led by Canada, the UK, Italy and Spain.

According to the Dubai Tourism and Trade Authority, 237,000 Russians visited the emirate during the first 6 months of 2010, which is 17% increase on last year. Natalie Tours, one of the top 10 Russian tour operators and one of the leaders for this destination, said that they sent up to 69,000 tourists to Dubai in 2010. Natalie Tours plain to double this figure in the next year. The Russian market is considered to be one of the priority markets for Dubai. According to the management of Atlantis the Palm hotel, Russian guests spend about 25-30% more than European or Australian visitors. In October 2010, the local low cost carrier Fly Dubai launched direct flights from the regional cities of Yekaterinburg and Samara to Dubai, greatly increasing the popularity of the destination in the Russian regions.

New visa center opened in Kazan

As the city of Kazan grows in importance as a source market for outbound travel, more European countries plan to open visa centers in the city. As of October, Spain, Denmark, Malta and the Netherlands opened a joint visa center. Bulgaria joined it in mid November, and France, Greece and Finland planning to follow in 2011. Before the visa center was opened, local people had to apply for the Schengen visa via Moscow, which made it expensive and time consuming.

Hanoi as a new destination for Yekaterinburg

As of November 14, Vladivostok Avia launched its first direct flight from Yekaterinburg to Hanoi, Vietnam. Previously people from Ekaterinburg wishing to visit Vietnam had to fly via Moscow or Tashkent in Uzbekistan. Many local companies are quite skeptical about the new destination, saying it would have been more logic to offer Ho Chi Min in the South of Vietnam, as that part of the country is in much greater demanded during the winter season The main tour operator for this route is the local company Forsazh Plus that mainly works with China and South East Asia.

Russia Has Most Engaged Social Networking Audience Worldwide

Com Score, Inc., a leader in measuring the digital world, reports that Russians are the heaviest social networkers worldwide in terms of time spent per user. Their study reveals that Yandex.Ru is the leading internet portal in Russia. In August 2010, 34.5 million Russian internet users (74.5% of the online audience) visited at least one social networking site. With an average of 9.8 hours per visitor during the month, Russians spent more than double the worldwide average of 4.5 hours per visitors on social networks, ranking it #1 among all countries in social networking engagement, followed by Israel and Turkey. "Vkontakte.ru" ranked as the top social networking site in Russia with 27.8 million visitors, followed by "Odnoklassniki" with 16.7 million visitors. Despite Facebook's strong leadership position both worldwide and in the majority of individual Internet markets, it ranked just fifth in Russia with 4.5 million visitors. However, its audience has grown 376% in the past year, outpacing each of the other top five social networking sites in the market.