SINGAPORE: Chinese visitors – courted by many for their tourist dollars – are returning to Singapore, but gone are the large tour groups in chartered buses.
Instead, many of the visitors are now travelling in smaller groups who prefer free and easy options, industry players said.
They are also requesting cultural experiences and opting for the road less travelled.
“As they are not first-timers in Singapore anymore … They are looking for new experiences. No more Universal Studios, but perhaps a tour to the heartlands, seeing the life of a local Singaporean,” said CEO of Oriental Travel & Tours Stanley Foo.
He added that other newer options on offer by his agency are tours to lesser-known destinations like Pulau Ubin and Kusu Island.
Spurred by others sharing their experiences on social media platforms like Xiaohongshu, also known as Rednote or Little Red Book, Chinese visitors are increasingly opting for shorter and more personalised tours, said Mr Wyman Poon, honorary secretary at the Society of Tourist Guides Singapore.
With about 2.9 million tourists in the first 11 months of last year, China overtook Indonesia as Singapore’s top source of visitors. The figure was 3.35 million over the same period in 2019, before COVID-19 struck.
While their numbers are not up to pre-pandemic times, they stayed for longer here on average last year – 3.8 days, up from 3.04 days in 2019.
