Sunny Spain is no longer growing in popularity, whilst the USA and Egypt should be preparing for more and more tourists, according to new statistics from the UK’s fastest growing online independent travel agent, sunshine.co.uk. Tourist’s reasons for their destination likes and dislikes are also revealed.

Sale statistics and holiday booking figures released by online travel agent sunshine.co.uk have revealed the destinations that are most (and least) popular with consumers today. Spain is no longer as popular as it once was, judging by percentage share of bookings at sunshine.co.uk, whilst the USA is becoming a more desirable place to go on holiday.

When looking at the reasons behind the popularity of certain resorts, sunshine.co.uk found that found that 59% of people didn’t find Spain as appealing because of the high density of English tourists and bars, claiming it was not foreign enough. USA, on the other hand, has seen bookings almost double and 48% said they would cross the pond just to try and meet a celebrity.

When asked if and why they would be put off visiting Tunisia on holiday, 2 respondents claimed they would prefer not to go because they were scared of camels. One person commented that they were less likely to holiday in the Canaries because they were afraid of birds, but Turkey was a hit with 11 people who said they’d go for the kebabs.

The top five destinations that have seen the biggest growth in popularity on sunshine.co.uk are;

1. Egypt
2. Greece
3. USA
4. Turkey
5. Portugal

The bottom five destinations that have seen the least growth in popularity on sunshine.co.uk are;

1. Malta
2.Canaries
3. Italy
4. Tunisia
5. Spain

Speaking about the most and least popular destinations, Chris Brown, co-founder of sunshine.co.uk said; “After looking at the popularity of certain destinations based on percentage share of bookings on our site from a trade point of view, we then wanted to hear why consumers like or dislike certain locations. Some of the reasons people gave for not wanting to holiday in certain places were very amusing, especially in the instance of the one respondent who was afraid of birds and as a result didn’t want to go to the Canaries."

He continued, “The fact that a select few would visit Turkey for a traditional Kebab is rather funny, but some of the reasons, such as Spain not being so popular for being “too English” were more common. On the contrary however, some did actually like the idea of Spain being a bit more familiar. I suppose in the case of holidays, everyone has different preferences.”