Current information about British tourism

Updated December 2024

Finland's position in the market

The UK views Finland as an efficiently run, secure, and environmentally conscious nation. While many British individuals perceive Finland as a chilly and costly Nordic destination, it is renowned for its association with Santa Claus and its dreamy winter landscapes, including the captivating Northern Lights. Finnish Lapland is continually enhancing its appeal and solidifying its status as the preferred choice for Nordic winter holidays. Vast majority of the British overnights in Finland take place in December and in Lapland.

In 2023, the UK emerged as Finland's second-largest source market, experiencing a noteworthy 12% YoY growth. Compared to 2019, there was a remarkable recovery in UK tourism to Finland, reaching the same level as in 2019. The UK held the third position in the market ranking in 2019.

January-October 2024 the overnights from UK had a very healthy 11% YoY growth. The growth was mainly in January and February, indicating that the winter season is prolonging, as well as in summer months, although the overall numbers remained small compared to December. This, however, shows that the development is on the right track and interest towards Finland as a year around destination is growing.

Among the other Nordic countries, Denmark and Iceland have rebounded from 2019 and gained market share. Finland and Norway have maintained their market share, while Sweden has experienced a decline in its market share and has not yet fully recovered. Norway and Denmark dominate the summer season for UK travellers.

Finnair remains the largest carrier in the UK with four daily flights from London Heathrow and one daily flight direct from Manchester, Edinburgh, and Dublin, which serves those travelling from Northern Ireland. Norwegian flies directly between London Gatwick and Helsinki daily. There has been a 22% growth from London Stanstead due to flights continuing daily with low-cost carrier Ryanair and they fly to Tampere twice a week.

UK Media and PR results in 2023 are as follows. The number of hits was 283, and the visibility score was 64%. The brand-building effect was 3,3 bn and the publicity value was 6m€. In terms of UK PR for January to October 2024 landed with 175 hits, generating 2,0 bn in BBE and 12m€ euros in publicity value.

Finland has managed to gain great visibility in UK media in January – October 2024. The most important medias, such as The Guardian, Forbes, BBC and Times have featured Finland during 2024. Thanks to the successful Helsinki Happiness Hacks campaign, Finland has been featured multiple times in varied TV channels in UK. The vast majority of Visit Finland’s PR activities are targeted for increasing Finland’s awareness as a year around destination with a special emphasis on summer months. Finland’s ranking as the most happiest country in the world remains as the single most interesting topic for the UK media, followed by themes such as outdoors, wellbeing and culture.

Consumer trends and behavior

Despite the economic pressures and geopolitical uncertainties, travel industry seems to show resilience and consumers’ willingness to invest into holidays remain strong. ABTA’s recent report reveals that travel remains a priority, with 84% of people who travelled 2024 taking more holidays than before, especially young families who continue to lead in frequency. This increase in travel activity highlights a growing consumer confidence that runs counter to broader economic concerns. Factors like inflation and rising costs have not significantly deterred people from planning and taking more trips.

When it comes to booking methods, UK travellers rely on a mix of modern technology and traditional options. The most popular method (51% of respondents) is to book directly through airline or hotel websites. However, closely followed behind is to use online travel agencies like Expedia or Booking.com (48%). Mobile apps, such as Airbnb or Hopper, are used by 28%, while slightly less than a quarter of Brits (24%) will use offline travel agents or agencies, according to YouGov.

Europe remains as the most popular destination for the British outbound travel, with traditional sun and beach holidays in destinations such as Spain, France and Italy as well as city-breaks leading the way. Luxury travel continues to grow and sustainability plays an increasingly important role, when choosing individual services within destination or assessing the means of travel. The most sustainably conscious Brits choose to travel domestically, and staycations remain popular. All-inclusive and package holidays are in demand. Other hot trends include solo travel, secondary city travel, luxury travel, cool-cations, bucket-list travel, gastronomy and set-jetting to favourite film and TV locations. Dark skies and Astro-tourism are also niche trend. When searching for holiday inspiration, Brits rely on social media (Facebook, Instagram, Tiktok and Pinterest), influencers as well as travel- and traditional media, such as magazines, newspapers and TV shows.

Flexible booking conditions remain paramount for both agents and travellers alike. In Finnish Lapland, early pricing availability for bookings extending well into 2026/27 is essential for travel companies to efficiently confirm arrangements for their clients.

Industry update and distribution channels

Most UK travel companies are flourishing thanks to the surge in outbound travel within the UK over the last year. UK companies have had to adapt their businesses to accommodate the change in booking patterns and trends. Companies are investing more in online booking and digital communication. TUI and Trailfinders are opening more high-street shops to meet the demand of their clients wanting face-to-face service.

Travel agents are providing valuable services that online booking cannot, such as detailed advice, navigating complex travel itineraries, and acting as a safety net when issues arise. This is driving more customers, including younger tech-savvy travellers, to use travel agents.

Booking.com, Expedia, and Last Minute are major OTAs in the UK. TripAdvisor, Skyscanner and Travel Supermarket are the top aggregator sites.

Key TOs that are operating in Finland are TUI (including TUI Crystal Ski, and TUI Tours), and Hotelplan (Inghams, Santa’s Lapland brands). Canterbury Travels and Destinology, (both part of Brooklyn Travel group), Artisan Travel Company with brands (Aurora Zone, Activities Abroad), Transun.

Other key companies include Magic of Lapland, Best Served Scandinavia, (Wexas), Discover the World, Arctic Direct, Magnetic North Holidays, ITC Regent Holidays, Exodus, Baltic Travel Company, Nordic Experience, Jules Verne, Trailfinders, Sunvil, Elegant Resorts, Abercrombie and Kent and Audley Travel.

DMCs as well as direct bookings are both in use among UK travel operators. In general, the use of DMCs are more in demand when packaging less established destinations or more complex packages. Demand is especially high for those DMCs that are able to package tailor made FIT tours.

In terms of flight accessibility, Finnair are increasing their flights from the UK to Helsinki for the winter. There will be 29 flights a week from London Heathrow. A double daily frequency will run from Manchester from October and Edinburgh will have two extra flights per week, totalling up to six departures a week. Finnair is also increasing flights from Dublin to from eight to ten a week. British Airways’ subsidiary BA Euroflyer has opened a new route from Gatwick to Ivalo, with 2 weekly departures for the winter season 2024.

Finland travel USP's

The single most important USP for Finland in the UK is Santa Claus, Finland's goodwill ambassadors, which drives most Lapland family bookings in December. Families traveling to Lapland in December to meet Santa are by far the single biggest British customer group for Finland, totalling some 40% of the overall British overnights in Finland. Other winter activities are of interest and often included in the Santa holiday package. Those include aspects such as husky- and snowmobile safaris, unique accommodations (glass igloos) and reindeer farm visits. Additionally Finland is seen as a ski destination in the UK and the demand for ski products outside the busy December season in Lapland is on the rise. Northern lights remain as a bucket list experience and a key decision driver for Brits, but Finland alone does not own this USP as the same experience is available in destination such as Norway and Iceland.

Sauna is becoming trendy also in the UK and Finland clearly owns the Sauna in the eyes of Brits. Sauna is often incorporated as something somewhat mandatory when visiting Finland and it goes especially well together with the outdoor experiences in nature. Lakeland as a region is seeing more demand and more and more tour operators are packaging Lakeland fly and drive tours for extended summer season. Those tours often include light activities in nature, interesting local culture experiences and charming accommodation completed with the Sauna experience.

Animal watching and photographing is somewhat of a special interest among the Brits, and especially bear-watching tours in Arctic Lakeland are a popular niche in UK. Similar interest can be seen towards Saimaa ringed seals, and such safari experiences could be even more highlighted as a special unique selling point for the Saimaa region.

Helsinki is viewed as a stand-alone city break destination, but also as the gateway to the rest of Finland. Some tour operators are looking to add a Helsinki stopover to their winter Lapland products, creating Helsinki an opportunity to increase their sales during the winter months. Similarly during the summer months Helsinki can benefit from those Brits seeking to experience regions such as Lakeland and Archipelago by offering Helsinki extensions to those tours.

There is an increased demand for outdoor nature-based and adventure travel among UK travellers, and is expected to continue growing. Factors driving this trend include increased interest in active holidays, a focus on sustainability, and a diverse range of outdoor activities available. Businesses and destinations catering to this market can expect to see sturdy growth and interest from UK adventure-seeking tourists.

Luxury travel is still growing, and the key trends among UK luxury travellers, include a focus on unique, immersive, cultural, and sustainable experiences; a priority on wellness and rejuvenation; a desire for personalised and curated offerings; and a willingness to travel for longer duration. Sustainable luxury accommodations, as well as private villas and chalets in secluded locations, are highly appealing to UK luxury travellers. When targeting to this demanding clientele it is essentially important that the service level meets their standards and a special attention needs to be paid on this. Tour operators have reported that currently Finnish supply, outside of Lapland, can often be regarded more as a “premium” rather than “luxury”.

Sustainability is a key priority for UK travellers, who are increasingly demanding Eco-friendly accommodations, sustainable transport options, responsible tourism experiences, and sustainable food and dining choices when planning their trips.

Future outlook and upcoming season

Travel companies have reported that sales to Finland for the upcoming winter season are looking promising. Majority of the pend-up demand since covid has now been filled, but the demand towards the Santa- and ski holidays in Lapland remain high, as per usual. Finnair’s strikes, lack of snow in the southern parts of Lapland in late November/early December and hence cancelled activities has caused some panicking among the consumers, which might lead to them rescheduling their travel plans to the later time in winter 2025 or to even next December.

Both, seat capacity to Finland from the UK during the winter months as well as the flight bookings have surpassed the pre-pandemic levels and the winter travel from the UK to Finland can be perceived as fully recovered. As Finland’s winter travel is the so-called bread and butter of the UK tour operators and it now recovered well after the covid, the tour operators can finally pick up from where they left with their new product development.

Tour operators such as Artisan Travel, Regent Holidays and Discover the World have put more emphasis into the snowless season product development and new itineraries in the southern parts of Finland have been launched for the summer season 2025. Fly and drive tours combining Helsinki and Lakeland seem to drive the development for new summer product supply in the UK. Helsinki combined with Tampere and Turku with its archipelago region seems to interest those FITs wanting to experience Helsinki and the “second-cities” sustainably on rails year around. Summer Lapland and the Midnight Sun products spark already some interest, but the strong winter image might play against its success in the short term. Lapland for the outdoor travellers during the autumn foliage, with the chance of seeing Northern lights, seems to be more appealing to at least some of the tour operators.

UK government passed a law in August 2024 that the parents will be fined £80 for child’s unnecessary absence from school. This might have an impact on UK families’ travel behaviour and concentrating the families’ travel on a shorter period than befor