CHINESE travel website Mafengwo recently unveiled its road trip column and 12 classic itineraries for destinations from home and abroad, in a promotional event in Beijing. It also announced its plan to provide travelers with one-stop road trip services by partnering with premium carmakers like Jaguar Land Rover, car rental platforms and road trip destinations. Through Mafengwo’s new road trip column, visitors will be able to browse various itineraries and travel tips, look for potential traveling companions, and purchase road trip products such as car rentals. Meanwhile, Mafengwo’s data showed that its users are paying more attention to road trips. For example, related content generated by users has increased 121 percent on average annually since 2017. And the search volume of “road trip” on Mafengwo has jumped by 230 percent every year on average since then. Separately, the website claimed that about 70 percent of the core consumers of road trip products were born in the 1980s or 1990s, and over 60 percent of them earn a monthly salary of more than 12,000 yuan (US$1,744). Yu Zhuo, senior vice president of Mafengwo, said that the younger generation of Chinese tourists are shifting from traditional sightseeing to personalized and themed in-depth tours, and road trips are one of the best ways. (SD-Agencies) | 