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Honeymooning in Mykonos with my new husband

In the time between my then boyfriend, now husband proposing, November 2007, and our wedding, April 2009, the world changed quite considerably. Like most brides-to-be when I first thought about a honeymoon I imagined a once in a lifetime, super luxurious holiday somewhere far away, but just as we started looking through brochures for beautiful beach resorts in Thailand, safari trips in South Africa and hotels in converted palaces in India, Lehman Brothers collapsed and we started to think twice about getting into debt for the sake of the typical ‘dream honeymoon’.

The economic climate has forced many travellers to re-think their holiday plans, an IPSOS poll published on 16^th June 2009 showed that 64% of Brits plan on taking a holiday this year, only a 3% drop since 2008, but the average budget allocated to a holiday has fallen by 14%. This is no different for honeymooners, they are still looking for a special, romantic holiday but concerns about the economic situation means that they are re-evaluating priorities and looking for ways to make their budget work for them.

Far from being a challenge for the travel industry this could be a big opportunity for destinations, hotels and airlines that don’t fit into the typical ‘dream honeymoon’ mould. Chat on the UK’s most popular wedding website youandyourwedding.co.uk indicates that brides to be are thinking beyond The Maldives and Mexico for honeymoon ideas. Under a popular thread entitled ‘Honeymoons for under £2k’ the destinations suggested are as diverse as The Channel Islands and Brazil. Like me, brides-to-be seem to be choosing to focus their budget on parts of the honeymoon that mean the most to them. In the end we flew with budget airline Easyjet to the Greek Island of Mykonos where we focused our budget on a boutique hotel and eating out, by contrast one contributor to the You and Your Wedding thread chose to spend her money on flights to Sri Lanka where she plans to travel around the island and stay in simple beach hut accommodation.

Perhaps we have clients around the world whose brands would not be top of mind for honeymooners, but could have something interesting to offer in this new age of the ‘mix and match’ budget and luxury honeymoon? The wedding media are certainly crying out for recession friendly wedding and honeymoon ideas making this a great PR opportunity.