Trend for nature: Tatarstan residents actively booking glamping sites for New Year holidays
A holiday in nature is gaining popularity — only a few glamping sites remain unbooked for New Year's Eve. As experts told Realnoe Vremya, most of the guests of such establishments are residents of the republic themselves. However, this year, there has been particular interest from Muscovites and St Petersburg residents. Read more about the trend towards ecotourism and its causes in a report of Realnoe Vremya.
“Everything was sold out for New Year's Eve back in October”
The popularity of glamping site is growing in Tatarstan, Deputy Director of the Development of Tourism and Recreation Projects at the Institute for the Development of Tatarstan Cities Oksana Sargina told Realnoe Vremya. According to preliminary data, the average occupancy rate at the beginning of autumn is about 70%.
“Glamping sites and campsites remain popular. We see an increase in the number of new recreation facilities, we see interest from entrepreneurs and investors who are coming to this industry,” she said.
In her opinion, such popularity is also connected with the general trend towards outdoor recreation and the availability of a wide choice:
“Various formats and concepts are presented in this area. There are facilities that, for example, only work with events, there is quiet recreation, retreats, etc. There are quite a lot of concepts. In general, this is connected with the general trend towards health improvement, being in nature, walking in the fresh air. City sites have already been explored, and now people are going out of town.”
Glamping sites are of particular interest before the New Year. According to the co-founder of Urman Camp Ilnar Khamidullin, all the houses on 1 January were booked back in October:
“Everything was sold out for New Year's Eve back in October. If we consider the holidays, there are one or two available houses for each date.”
Realnoe Vremya contacted glamping bases. Here is the data on some of them:
- Yal Home — all houses are booked from 29 December to 2 January.
- My Ahome — all houses are booked for the entire holidays. Only one house is available on 2 January.
- YURT Resort — four houses are available on New Year's Eve.
“Tatarstan was the first”
For Tatarstan, this type of recreation is quite new, Sargina said. The first site in the republic appeared only in 2020.
“For Tatarstan, the hotel business in the suburban sector is a new type of recreation. It has been developing for four years. Of course, not everyone has had time to try it yet. In addition, this topic is trending throughout Russia, and Tatarstan is no exception,” she explained the popularity of glamping sites.
It is noteworthy that not only residents of the republic vacation in glampings of Tatarstan — about 30% of guests come from other regions of Russia, and a few are from abroad.
“Those arriving are from Tatarstan and the nearest large cities. This year there are a lot of guests from Moscow and St Petersburg. For them, even taking into account the cost of travel, vacation here is cheaper than in the Moscow region and other closer areas,” said Khamidullin.
According to him, the interest in the republic's glamping sites is explained primarily by the attractiveness of Tatarstan itself:
“The attractiveness of Tatarstan points is determined, firstly, by the popularity of the republic itself as a tourist destination. We are in third place in Russia. Secondly, we have a fairly high quality of glamping sites themselves.”
At the same time, Tatarstan was not among the pioneers of outdoor recreation — the first glamping site in Russia opened back in 2016. Now there are about 700 of them in the country, and more than 50 in the republic.
“Despite the fact that the first glamping opened back in 2016, Tatarstan was the first to create a directorate for ecotourism and the development of this area. A lot of facilities appeared in the shortest possible time thanks to the support of the republic,” added Khamidullin.
“This is impression marketing”
Glamping site is often confused with camping, said Khamidullin. The difference lies in the level of comfort. If camping implies a platform for a tent and hiking conditions, then glamping site is a vacation in nature without giving up civilization. Each room has a shower, toilet, etc.
The concept of glamping site is maximum privacy with nature, but without giving up the comfort of civilization. The ideology is marketing of impressions. If you compare it with regular hotels, you come to them to spend the night after activities in the city, and, apart from sleep, you don’t need anything else. People come to glamping for new emotions — hot procedures under the open starry sky, interaction with animals, silence, etc.,” he explained.
The speaker named several factors that influenced the popularity of glamping holidays:
- high cost of foreign trips;
- novelty of the format;
- stress reduction.
“The level of anxiety and stress among people has recently increased. Glamping site allows you to relax and forget, because nature is very energising. A person recovers well,” added Khamidullin.