Canada’s Travel Sector Adjusts to Declining U.S.-Bound Bookings
David Ciccarelli has been operating his vacation rental platform Lake.com out of Toronto since 2023. Specializing in lakeside accommodations, the United States made up 65 per cent of the site’s user searches in 2024.
“When we conceptualized Lake.com, we anticipated attracting rental properties in popular U.S. destinations, such as Lake Tahoe, Lake of the Ozarks, and the Finger Lakes region,” Mr. Ciccarelli says.
After announcements of reciprocal trade tariffs that fuelled political tensions and weakened the Canadian dollar, many Canadians stopped travelling to the United States.
Like many businesses, Ciccarelli was forced to adapt. He quickly began setting up partnerships with property management systems in Europe, and he is now sending clients to lakeside villas in Lake Como, Lake Garda, and the shores around the Mediterranean.
“We have to fish where the fish are,” Ciccarelli says. “If we’re seeing growth outside North America, then we’ll invest time, energy, and resources in pursuing growth where growth is happening.”
That type of agility has also proven crucial for Francine Cochrane and Angela Weir, co-owners of Playcation Travel Ltd in London, Ont. When the pair started their company in 2022, after almost two decades of working as travel agents, it was built on their reputation as experts on Walt Disney World and Universal Studios. Now, many of their regular Disney-goers are replacing U.S. amusement-park vacations with Caribbean cruises.
“They’re trying to find that entertainment for kids on a ship or an all-inclusive,” Cochrane says, adding that river cruising is becoming a particularly popular alternative. Other family clients are trading Disney vacations for European ones, while the snowbirds who have typically wintered in Florida or Arizona are going to Costa Rica, Mexico, or the Dominican Republic.
eir and Cochrane say it’s not just tariffs that are keeping people away from the United States – it’s the political climate. “When there’s something in the news, everything’s at a standstill for a week or two,” Weir says.
She was recently working with a number of Canadian clients making U.S. inquiries who put their trip plans on pause after Charlie Kirk’s assassination. “Tariffs are a big part of it, but it’s also a concern of the culture currently in the U.S.,” Weir says.
As a result of this reactivity, Weir says businesses that would otherwise be planning their marketing strategies far in advance must be ready to pivot quickly to accommodate shifting public opinion. “If tariffs come out strong on the news one day, we don’t want to be advertising cruises to Florida the next,” she explains.
Ari Sargon, founder of Toronto’s EduTravel, has been organizing school trips to New York and other U.S. cities for more than 15 years. In 2025, there’s been a nearly complete drop in interest among school boards for American itineraries, he says. “Some of the arts courses have pivoted to trips to London … but it’s a completely different price point.”
A lot of graduation trips that typically included Boston, Chicago or Washington are pivoting to Ottawa, Montréal, and Niagara Falls – but schools are often struggling to fill buses. “A 17-year-old kid who has likely been to Niagara Falls with their family isn’t as motivated to save up from their part-time job to travel within Canada,” Sargon says.
While he’d like to send students on trips to Halifax, Cape Breton and Vancouver, he points out teenagers usually want to see Times Square before exploring eastern or western Canada.
Business travel to the U.S. is also down among Canadians. Danielle Riddle, CEO of Vancouver’s Inspired Travel Group, has worked to find alternatives for corporate retreats. A client that typically hosts annual retreats in California chose to host in Spain this year. Another that also typically heads to the United States took employees to Costa Rica. In both instances, Riddle says, the trips were more cost effective, and they gave both her employees and her clients a chance to think outside the box.
Riddle’s company has also seen an increase in clients hosting retreats in Asia, the Caribbean, and here in Canada, encouraging her to expand her partnerships with boutique hotels and retreat venues in those locations. “It’s exciting and rewarding for a niche agency like ours,” Riddle says. “It’s strengthened our portfolio, particularly domestically, with destinations like Okanagan wine country, the Rockies, and the Maritimes.”
Christine James, vice-president in Canada for Travel Leaders Network, a global network of retail travel agencies with 500 members, says she’s seen a rise in demand this year for domestic trips. Canadians are quickly becoming more likely than Americans to travel domestically, she notes, which is the reversal of a long-standing trend.
James says the uptick is great for our domestic economy and tourism industry: “Canadians are still travelling and don’t look at travel as a luxury. Especially in the winter months, they see travel as a necessity.”
This article was first reported by The Globe and Mail
