In October 2020, German travel agencies were able to sell 94 percent fewer tickets. Things didn't look much better in the area of cruises either, with a decline of 81 percent. In the tourism industry, 82 percent fewer package tours were sold, according to the Tats travel agency index.
Due to numerous cancellations, the bottom line is that the agencies were even in the red. In the area of package tours, this leads to a decrease of 114 percent. In the case of cruises, it was even minus 133 percent. The cumulative order backlog in tourism was minus 66 percent. This means that significantly more trips were canceled than were newly booked.
The online competition is hardly going any better, because Holidaycheck, for example, generated a loss of 31 million euros in the first nine months of the current year. Sales fell from 103,7 million euros to 11,2 million euros. The Internet travel agent has already cut its staff considerably and has also parted with an Amsterdam-based subsidiary. The effects of the crisis are nevertheless severe, because the liquid funds were increased by drawing on credit lines and special Covid loans. The sale of the Dutch subsidiary brought in 14,4 million euros. It should be noted that the improvement in liquidity to 44,6 million euros was achieved through loans. These have to be paid back at some point.