Naturist tourism shows 20 percent growth in 2019

Naturist tourism in Thailand showed a 20 percent growth in the first six month of 2019 compared to same half year in 2018.

According to the statistics collected by Naturist Association Thailand from all the naturist resorts in Thailand, there were in 2019 during the first half year 735 more rooms sold than in 2018.

Naturist tourism in Thailand is not experiencing the problems that tourism in Thailand in general is facing, but the expansion has slowed down during the first half of 2019. Last year, in 2018, the naturist resorts enjoyed a 65 percent increase in the first half of the year. And the year before the sector had a 90 percent growth in the first six months - almost doubling its number of room nights.

Naturist tourists are individual travelers with a preference for resorts where they can be naked at all times without offending other people. They are generally in the higher income bracket, higher educated, more health conscious and more culturally sensitive than the average tourist. They are also generally more sociable and friendly towards fellow resort guests.

Naturist Association Thailand started measuring the growth of the sector in 2016. Since then, the total number of room nights have been expanding faster than any other tourism sector in Thailand.

Total room nights in 2016 were 2774 rooms. In 2017 it expanded 75 percent to 4813 room nights. In 2018 it expanded further to 7090 room nights. So far, the number of room nights recorded during the first half of 2019 is already higher than for the whole year of 2017.

To catch up with the growth, Naturist Association Thailand participated in the spring 2019 Thai Tieaw Thai exhibition in Bangkok. The purpose was among others to network with the Tourism Authority of Thailand regions also present at the exhibition to ask for their help in locating potential resorts in their region or province, that might be suitable for changing market to being a naturist resort. They would typically be small to media resorts, located relatively isolated from the mainstream tourism areas and suffering from the current downward trend for European, American and Australian tourists.

Naturist resorts are being evaluated by the board of Naturist Association Thailand on an individual basis and sign in case of approval a contract which binds them to follow the strictly non-sexual concept of naturism. In return, Naturist Association Thailand helps promote the resorts towards the increasing number of naturists travellers from around the world. Currently, Thailand has only seven naturist resorts.