The bicycle touring market

France is by far the main destination proposed by tour operators, followed by Austria, while Germany and the United Kingdom are the main emitting market for bicycle touring in Europe. The requirement of a continuous, safe, pleasant route with good signage is universal. The literature has no stable trend in this respect. Bicycle touring is not included in Eurostat tourism statistics nor in other general studies on national or international tourism. It should be noted that the development of bicycle touring, both in terms of supply and demand, is uneven across Europe. In countries such as Austria, Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, Switzerland and the Netherlands, bicycle touring is important.
A repeat of the 2009 survey shows that most specialists now believe that bicycle touring is developing in the respective countries (while its evolution was considered “stable” in 2006) the previous investigation, despite the difficult economic situation. There is no definitive answer to the question of the value of European bicycle touring market. However, a model has been developed that uses current tourism stream fractions across Europe to estimate the value and volume of bicycle touring. With it, the annual number of tourist visits was estimated at the level of 2.295 billion in Europe, with a value of over 44 billion euros. This is the estimated total amount of national and international bicycle visits. The number of cyclists whose visit includes at least one night is 20.4 million, which together spend about 9 billion euros per year.