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Sweden

Sweden

Visitor characteristics

  • Visitors come from a broad range of age groups and there are about equal numbers of male and female visitors
  • Nearly four-in-five holiday visitors are making a repeat trip to Britain (excluding British nationals)
  • A significant proportion of visitors live in or around Stockholm
  • 89% of departing visitors say they are ‘very’ or ‘extremely likely’ to recommend Britain for a holiday

Popular activities

Sightseeing of Famous Buildings/ Monuments

Visited a Pub

Went Shopping

Global context

Measure2017
International tourism expenditure (US$bn)17.0
Global rank for international tourism expenditure23
Number of outbound visits (m)15.1
Most visited destinationSpain

Key demographic and economic data

Measure2018
Population (m)10.0
GDP per capita PPP (US$)47,692
Annual average GDP growth over past decade (%)1.9
Annual average GDP growth in the past year (%)2.7

Resources

Sweden market profile (PDF, 3MB)

visitbritain_marketprofile_sweden.pdf

Read about the preferences of Europeans towards tourism. Published March 2015

2015-3 Preferences of Europeans towards tourism_12.pdf

Find out where visitors from Sweden to the UK reside in their own country. Published 2016

annual_states_of_residence_2016_for_web.xlsx

More resources

Sweden market snapshot

sweden_snapshot_oct2018.pdf

Sweden aviation profile (PDF, 544KB)

sweden_aviation_profile_07092018.pdf

Exchange rate

1 GBP = 11.5062 SEK

As of 7 December 2018

Retrieved from the Bank of England

Inbound visits to Britain

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Seasonality (Share of visits)

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Regional spread (Share of visits)

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Journey purpose (Share of visits)

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What Swedes think about Britain

  • Swedes are more upbeat than average in their opinion regarding how welcome Britain is, but do not hold Britain in high regard for scenic natural beauty
  • The cultural product Swedes most strongly associate with Britain is music, followed by films, museums and pop videos
  • Of importance to Swedes when thinking about holiday destinations are the chance to have ‘fun and laughter’ and ‘enjoy the beauty of the landscape’ with the US seen as the ‘best place’ to get the former and Australia and Italy the latter
  • Swedes are more likely to nominate Britain as the best place to ‘meet the locals’ then they are other leading destinations
  • 40% of Swedes say they would like to spend a night in a Scottish castle

 

Caring for visitors

  • Swedes expect good-value accommodation and will use budget acommodation - they will expect en-suite facilities and wooden/tiled floors
  • Swedes will take more notice of environmental credentials than visitors from many other markets
  • Visitors from Sweden are more likely than the average visitor to use a credit card to pay for goods and services in Britain

The leisure & travel trade

  • The Swedish trade can be roughly split into four categories of charter operators, business travel/MICE, online operators and retail travel agents with many companies offering a mix of the four services
  • The key centres for travel trade are Stockholm, Gothenburg and Malmo
  • There is no distinct planning cycle so it is possible to do business in Sweden throughout the year

Access to Britain from Sweden

Measure2017
Weekly aircraft departures196
Weekly seat capacity33,816
Airports with direct routes in Sweden4
Airports with direct routes in Britain8
  • The majority of visits to Britain from Sweden are made by air
  • The bulk of seat capacity serves the Stockholm to London corridor
  • Four airlines operate virtually all capacity between Sweden and Britain
  • Copenhagen in Denmark is also a popular gateway to the UK from the South of Sweden
  • Visitors departing Britain to travel home to Sweden by air are charged £13 in Air Passenger Duty if travelling in economy class
    (2017 data, excludes flights to Cambridge and from Malmo, Ostersund and Avidsjaur)

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