Work trend: when the home office is on the beach

Work and vacation: For more and more people, these are no longer opposites. For the cold season, longer stays in the hot south are particularly popular with tour operators.

Work where others go on vacation: That’s the idea behind “Workation”. The term is made up of the English words “work” and “vacation”. That may sound a bit cumbersome, but the idea behind it certainly isn’t. Digital networks make it possible to work flexibly from vacation spots.

Vacation and Home Office Fusion

It’s true that not everyone can move their home office to the beach or the mountains and go straight into vacation mode before or after work. In principle, you should be able to do your work with the help of digital technologies from virtually anywhere in the world, as long as you have a working Internet connection.

These can be computer scientists, bloggers, designers or even public relations experts. Freelancers in particular have an advantage here; Employees first have to get the go-ahead from the boss.

Job offers in high demand

A look at the supply side shows that “work” is a growing trend that doesn’t just affect a small group of “digital nomads”: some hotels now have rooms with office equipment, the best WiFi and printers ready for it.

Tour operators are also sensing and reacting to the growing demand for Workation offerings. For stays of more than three weeks, around 1,500 bookings for a special offer for the cold season were received in just a few days, TUI, Europe’s largest tour operator, announced today.

Long vacations and work are in fashion

On average, customers opted for almost 25 nights and spent €2,258 per person on the trip. At peak times, travelers stayed up to 63 nights in a row.

“With the new possibilities of working from home and flexible working hours models, the Workation trend has created a completely new clientele,” emphasizes Stefan Baumert, CEO of TUI Deutschland. “All in all, the segment of long-term and working vacationers could soon surpass the 100,000 threshold.”

High energy prices: escape to the hot south?

Turkey, North Africa with Egypt and Tunisia, as well as the Canary Islands, such as Tenerife or Fuerteventura, are currently in particularly high demand. For some long-term vacationers and Workation fans, the higher energy costs in this country may also play a role.

After all, energy costs for a model home rose by around 85 percent or €3,636 to €7,912 in September compared to the same month last year, comparison portal Check24 calculates. “Consumers are paying more for heating this winter than ever before,” explains Steffen Suttner, Energy Manager at Check24. There is no end in sight at the moment. “With temperatures particularly below freezing, energy costs will continue to rise.”

High inflation as a brake on consumption

Workation is not just a winter trend, as TUI Germany CEO Baumert emphasizes. The potential for this is there in both summer and winter. But high inflation, which reached an all-time high of 10.0 percent in Germany in September, has what it takes to curb demand for holidays in general and thus job openings as well.

“In perspective, travel prices will also rise,” Norbert Fiebig, president of the German Travel Association (DRV), said yesterday. Therefore, it is necessary to wait and see how the propensity to consume will develop in the coming weeks in the context of rising inflation. The simple question when it comes to vacation budgeting is, “Will people still have money in their wallets?”