Hands up, who would like a free night in a hotel?
Hotels.com has revealed that savvy travelers from Hong Kong beat the rest of the world when it came to snapping up a free night away.
The accommodation experts have looked back at the millions of free nights redeemed, to uncover who are the world’s savviest travelers.
Holiday lovers based in Hong Kong, Seoul and Los Angeles topped the list, with New Yorkers coming in fourth and Texans from Houston completing the top five savviest cities list.
With a free hotel night up for grabs, more than one in eight travellers globally booked up their hotel stay the very same day and usually opted for a 4-star property. A third booked up their beds on their smartphone – a growing trend for today’s on-the-go travelers.
Top destinations and hotel hotspots
The top five destinations where all global travellers visited were the tourist hubs of New York, Las Vegas, London, Paris and San Francisco.
When it came to the hotels themselves, the draw of spending a free night in a five star abode on the Las Vegas strip was impossible to resist. All of the top five hotels where free nights have been taken were in Sin City:
1. The Venetian Resort Hotel & Casino
2. ARIA Resort & Casino
3. MGM Grand Hotel & Casino
4. Bellagio Las Vegas
5. Mandalay Bay Resort and Casino
Top 25 savviest travellers who have booked a free night come from:
1. HONG KONG
2. SEOUL
3. LOS ANGELES
4. NEW YORK
5. HOUSTON
6. SINGAPORE
7. LONDON
8. CHICAGO
9. STOCKHOLM
10. OSLO
11. DALLAS
12. ATLANTA
13. SAN FRANCISCO
14. PARIS
15. MIAMI
16. LAS VEGAS
17. TOKYO
18. DENVER
19. SAN JOSE
20. PHOENIX
21. SAN DIEGO
22. COPENHAGEN
23. SAO PAULO
24. ORLANDO
Treehouses, ranches and palaces
It wasn’t just hotels where free nights were spent, as hundreds of travellers opted for something a little quirkier and chose to stay in a castle, in a palace, on a house boat or on a ranch – with one lucky adventurer even staying in a treehouse in Swedish Lapland!
Katie Junod, Loyalty Director of Hotels.com Brand said: ‘To hit 25 million Rewards members in our 25th year is a great achievement and since the program launched over 9 million free nights have been redeemed. With thousands of properties to choose from, we’ve also seen members venturing far and wide, to enjoy their free night away, none more so than the savvy travellers from Hong Kong. If you’re looking for inspiration on where to spend your free night, follow our customers’ lead and try 24 hours in a riad in Morocco or a night in a picturesque castle in Prague!’
One Night Wonders Study
Hotels.com also conducted a One Night Wonders global study to find out if travelers could jump on a plane tomorrow for just one day, where they’d go and what they’d do.
Paris came out as the top dream destination, according to 29 percent of travellers, with New York (26 percent) and Tokyo (26 percent) following closely behind.
Travelers would splash the cash and pay on average $984 to spend 24 hours in their desired destination. They’d also be prepared to travel 12 hours on average to get there and the ultimate stay would be in a beach house (47 percent), a castle (46 percent), a house boat (40 percent) or an underwater hotel (37 percent).
50 percent would choose a super luxurious 5-star hotel and 51 percent would take their partner to enjoy their one night experience. Travellers would cram as much into their 24-hour stay as possible, with 58 percent wanting to spend the whole time awake and sightseeing, 41 percent would eat all the local food in sight, 20 percent would party like there was no tomorrow and one in ten would live stream their entire trip.
The real dream though would be to arrive in style in a private jet (30 percent), automatically be able to speak the local lingo (31 percent), eat at the chef’s table of a Michelin star restaurant (33 percent), party with a celebrity (32 percent) and have a super power for the day (25 percent).
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