As concerts drive travel, Trip.com and Live Nation look beyond the encore

Trip.com Group is looking to expand its concert travel packages beyond tickets and accommodation, with attractions, dining and transport among the additional offerings it is exploring.

The travel platform is working with Live Nation Entertainment to develop packages that bring together concert tickets, hotels and other travel products, as live music increasingly influences where consumers choose to travel.

Speaking at a media session yesterday, Edison Chen (pictured center), vice president of global destination marketing and public relations at Trip.com Group, said booking volumes had grown by almost 60% year-on-year, with demand remaining strong for the coming months

"Nowadays, travellers are not planning shows around a trip, but the other way. Concerts and events are becoming key drivers for travellers when choosing a destination," he said. 

The partnership, which began in 2025, brings together Live Nation's entertainment industry connections and Trip.com's travel booking capabilities. While Live Nation focuses on organising concerts and working with artists, Trip.com handles the packaging and sale of travel products.

"We are not positioning ourselves as a ticketing platform, but more like a holistic solution to provide a one-stop travel experience to counter some of the challenges for concertgoers when they want to visit concerts or travel to a destination just for the event itself," Chen said.

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The commercial opportunity is reflected in the companies' report, "The concert travel effect in Asia", which surveyed 1,768 respondents across Mainland China, Singapore, Hong Kong, Macao, Thailand and South Korea.

The research found that 65% of concertgoers surveyed had travelled to another country or region for a show, while seven in 10 said live music was one of the most exciting reasons to travel. Securing concert tickets was the biggest driver of live music travel planning for 62% of respondents, while 84% expressed interest in packages combining concerts with travel products.

Trip.com Group also reported that bookings for bundled ticket packages grew 64% year-on-year in the first half of 2026.

Beyond tickets and hotel stays

Trip.com is now exploring ways to extend the concert experience through attractions, local transportation and dining.

Chen said the company began with ticket and hotel packages because these addressed some of the biggest challenges concertgoers faced when planning their trips. However, it is now looking at what else it can offer fans during their stay.

"Sometimes local transportation can be one of the challenges. Everybody knows that after the concerts, getting transportation is quite a challenge," he said. As such, the company is working with venues, event organisers and other stakeholders to explore transport services such as shuttle buses to take concertgoers back to their hotels. It is also considering partnerships with local restaurants to develop packages combining tickets, accommodation and dining.

Trip.com is also looking to make its offerings more accessible to different budgets. Chen said the company was working with hotels to develop packages featuring both premium five-star properties and more affordable three- and four-star accommodation.

Location is another consideration, with the company working to improve how it communicates the distance between hotels and concert venues, as well as available transport options.

The offerings are also being integrated into Trip.com's platform through a dedicated "Trip Events" section on its app homepage, which showcases live entertainment events. For events where Trip.com is a ticketing partner, fans can access packages combining tickets with hotels or attractions. The platform also provides event information for shows where it has yet to partner with the organisers.

The opportunity extends beyond travel platforms, with hotels also looking to differentiate their offerings around major events.

Chen pointed to his stay at Dorsett Kai Tak in Hong Kong when attending The Weeknd's concert. The hotel provided dedicated wristbands to facilitate access to rooms, hospitality services to manage crowds returning after the show, and its own merchandise for concertgoers.

"Rather than just providing accommodation services, hotel partners are also trying to find their ways to provide value-added services into the whole packages. It also creates a good travel and stay experience for the travellers," he said.

According to the report, concertgoers would ideally spend an average of four days at their destination, while hotels, flights and attractions or activities were among the most valued additions to travel packages.

Fandom drives cross-border demand

For Live Nation, the growth of concert tourism is closely tied to the expansion of live music across Asia and the availability of venues to support more performances.

James Dick (pictured far right), EVP of partnerships and media at Live Nation Entertainment, said the company was prioritising venue development and management to meet growing demand from artists and fans.

This includes taking over the management of Impact Arena in Bangkok, alongside Grange House in Singapore and its first venue in Hong Kong.

"One of our strategic inputs is building venues. If we have the venues, then we can service the artists, and then if the artists come, the fans will come. That's critical for us," shared Dick. 

The report highlights how different artists and fan communities create distinct travel patterns across the region. K-pop acts including BTS and BLACKPINK generate particularly strong overseas ticket demand in Singapore and Thailand, ranging from 20% to 38%.

In Bangkok, K-pop concerts attract nearly twice the share of overseas audiences compared with other concert acts. Overseas audiences attending these shows primarily come from Hong Kong, Vietnam, the Philippines and Malaysia.

The impact can also be seen in travel bookings. Following Trip.com presales for BTS WORLD TOUR 'ARIRANG', flight bookings from Hong Kong and Singapore to Bangkok increased by 309% and 200% respectively within three days.

Dick said Singapore could also benefit when international artists choose to perform in selected regional markets, creating pent-up demand among fans from neighbouring countries.

He cited Lady Gaga's decision to perform in Singapore as her only regional stop as an example of how a single concert destination can attract fans from Indonesia, Malaysia and other markets.

For Trip.com, this demand also means approaching concertgoers differently from conventional leisure travellers. Chen said regular travellers typically choose a destination before planning their activities, whereas concertgoers tend to start with the artist and work backwards from there.

Concertgoers are also more likely to prioritise accommodation near the venue, while some are willing to spend more on premium experiences, including better seats and hotels.

For both companies, the aim is to make the concert the starting point of a wider destination experience, encouraging fans to explore and spend beyond the show itself. As Chen puts it: 

The concert can gather the people together, and the destination will extend the stay.

Photo credits to Lany, Instagram.

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