Here at Wilderness Motorhomes, we’ve noticed some interesting shifts in traveller behaviour since the Global Financial Crisis of a few years back. People pay a lot more attention to their travel budgets than they used to.As a campervan rental company, this has worked in our favour. Instead of staying in hotels and hiring a rental car, more and more people are choosing to combine their transport and accommodation by hiring a motorhome, and spending the money they’ve saved on activities during their holiday. This has led to a rise in popularity of campervan and motorhome rentals, which are no longer seen as a ‘backpacker’ option but as a very acceptable, comfortable and popular form of travel for people from all walks of life. And as more discerning people are now travelling by rental campervan, the quality and design of the campervans and motorhomes available for hire is vastly superior to what it once was. Take our Escape motorhome – a decade ago no one would have dreamed that such a quality European motorhome would be available to travellers to hire in New Zealand!
But I digress. Another thing we’ve noticed over the past few years is a change in booking patterns. Before the GFC, we could forecast bookings for our summer season pretty accurately – most of these came from Europe and booked at least 6 months in advance, and most booked through travel agents. Now, we receive the majority of our bookings directly from the travellers themselves via online booking, and they book at much shorter notice. While this becomes a little tricky for our operations team (they definitely deserve a bonus at this time of year!) , if you’re one of those people who tends to book at the last minute, this works in your favour as you’re more likely than before to find a rental motorhome still available.
So, if you’re considering a New Zealand summer campervan rental holiday, we are pleased to let you know that we still have a few campervans left over the next few months. We’re getting down to the wire here, with Christmas just around the corner, and not all motorhome models are available, nor are all dates (bear in mind we have some public holidays in NZ over summer too). But if you’re looking at going away over that period, do contact us to see if we can help. We’ll do what we can to accommodate you!
