More foreign tourists are returning to Korea, according to a report published Thursday by Seoul-based travel platform CreaTrip.
CreaTrip said around 14.5 percent of its foreign customers who had used the platform during an earlier visit to Korea returned for another visit over the past two years, meaning one in seven customers were repeat visitors.
The data covers reservations made from January to September this year, with the figure up 3.5 percentage points from the same period last year.
Returning tourists visited Korea an average of 2.4 times, with an average interval of 351 days between visits, the company said.
"The high re-booking rates for K-pop, K-beauty and K-food show that Korea's distinctive culture and lifestyle have become competitive tourism products," CreaTrip CEO Im Hye-min said.
Taiwanese tourists recorded the highest repeat-visit rate at 20.8 percent. Revisiting tourists from Hong Kong, Japan and English-speaking countries also increased, with the rate of English-speaking visitors rising 1.7-fold from a year earlier.
K-pop-related bookings, including tickets for music shows or music awards, saw the sharpest increase in repeat reservations, rising to 15.5 percent this year from 5.7 percent last year, nearly a 2.7-fold increase.
Among English-speaking visitors, hair-related services had the highest repeat booking rate.
Hong Kong visitors showed the strongest preference for culinary experiences, which accounted for 14.3 percent of the repeat bookings. Hair salons, dermatology services and other K-beauty experiences also ranked among their frequently rebooked services.
mjcha@heraldcorp.com
