VFR Travelers: How Long are They Staying?

Abstract

The Visiting Friends and Relatives (VFR) segment of travelers is a substantial segment of tourism in many destinations around the world. However, relative to its size, research has been lacking, commencing only around 20 years ago, and gaining momentum only this century. Research into VFR traveler profiles and characteristics has been limited, and some of what has been found conflicts with other findings. One such conflict relates to travelers' length of stay. While some research indicates that VFR travel is associated with long length of stay, other research indicates that it is associated with short-break tourism. The purpose of this research was to examine the length of stay for VFR travelers compared with non-VFR travelers at three contrasting destinations in Australia. Although the average length of stay varied among destinations, there was no significant difference between VFR and non-VFR travelers at each destination. That is, in this study VFR travel was not found to be associated with either short or long stay at the three destinations considered. However, length of stay was longer the more popular the destination was with tourists. As such, it is concluded that VFR travelers stay at more attractive destinations longer than at less attractive destinations, but not at any significantly different level to non-VFRs.