Overseas travel is growing among the French and the increase in direct flights to Scotland presents opportunities for main-holiday business and for the fast growing short and city break segments. The trend in the UK market is towards short breaks. The average length of stay by UK visitors has decreased from 5.4 nights in 1970 to 4.5 nights in 1998. In 1998 English visitors to Scotland spent over 1 billion and Scots spent 353million making the UK market our largest. While there is still an important main holiday market for couples and families, this is in decline because of the preference for overseas holidays.
Scottish residents remain an important market for Scotland.
But this has been balanced to an extent by growth in 1-3 night trips. This market is volatile and expenditure fluctuates widely from year to year. The Scots market presents a particularly important off season opportunity. Business tourism Discretionary business tourism is worth c. 450million per annum to Scotland. It is particularly important because of its high yield, out of season potential and links with wider economic development.