And we thought Cyber Monday was big last year…
Move over Cyber Monday, 2016, you are now our #2 booking day of all time. Cyber Monday 2017 (November 27) set a 17 year booking record for the most tickets sold in a single day: 33% more than last Cyber Monday. We had up to 737 searches per minute on the site, which represents a 38% increase in searches YoY. Site traffic was also up 21% YoY.
One of the things we were most excited about (in addition to the overall sales) was that 42% of bookings on Cyber Monday came from travelers booking with us for the first time!
Students were booking:
- The regions that students were booking to most frequently were domestic flights within the US (up 38% YoY), US to Europe (up 26% YoY), US to Asia (up 25% YoY) and US to Central/South America (up 45% YoY).
- The top routes booked were New York to London, Chicago to New York and Los Angeles to New York.
- Nearly a third (29%) of students were booking travel for 31-60 days in advance.
- 52% of bookings were made for one-way flights.
Most popular routes of travel:
- Short-lead domestic travel for the weeks of December 11 and December 18 (likely to go home from school) and travel for the week of New Year’s were the top sellers.
- Travel from the US to Europe for the week of Christmas and the week of March 5 (the start of Spring Break) were the most popular itineraries booked. London, Paris and Amsterdam were the most popular destinations.
- Travel from the US to Asia for Winter break (the week of 12/18) with Shanghai, Beijing and Hong Kong as the most popular destinations.
- Travel from Europe to the US from mid-December through the week of January 8 for students returning home from study abroad. These students were flying back most frequently from London to New York, Paris to New York and London to Boston.
In addition to Cyber Monday, Black Friday was (November 24) was our third biggest sales day of all time. We sold 18% more tickets than Black Friday last year, traffic was up 59% YoY and searches were up 55% YoY as well.
64% of Black Friday bookings were for domestic travel and another 17% were from the US to Europe (up 103% YoY). The most popular routes booked were New York to London, London to New York and San Francisco to Los Angeles.
We want to thank all of our partners who made these days such a success. We look forward to beating these goals in 2018!