Introduction

Covid-19 was supposed to represent a transformational break in tourism, allowing the sector to reset travel towards a more sustainable future (Hall & Seyfi, 2020; Haywood, 2020; Sigala, 2020). It was driven, in part, by the hope that the forced break in travel and an increased awareness of the extent of global issues such as the pandemic and climate change would encourage people to modify their travel behaviours and become more responsible, environmentally aware tourists (Eichelberger et al., 2021). Authors like Brouder et al. (2020) and others highlighted that the enforced break provided a once-in-a-generation opportunity for government, industry and consumers to rethink what tourism should look like in the future. Indeed, a large number of academics pontificated about the hoped-for new normal in tourism (e.g. Assaf & Suderi, 2020; Ateljevic, 2020; Brouder et al., 2020; Şengel, 2021). This trend became so popular that a Google Scholar search in June 2024 using the keywords ‘New Normal’ and ‘Tourism’ yielded 56,800 hits.