According to recent research more and more people in the UK are looking to spend Christmas day away from home. A UK based holiday company can reveal that more people than ever are choosing to book somewhere to stay over Christmas and New Year, rather than spend time at home. In addition 36% of Brits are looking to take part in an outdoor activity such as cycling or surfing on Christmas Day, rather than spending the day eating and drinking with family.

Blue Chip Holidays have so far this year seen a 26% increase in bookings for the Christmas and New Year periods compared to last year, and a 60% increase on Christmas 2013. Investigating this further they found that more people would like to spend Christmas day away from home and doing something different.

The team at www.bluechipholidays.co.uk polled a total of 1,158 UK adults, all over the age of 18, for this study. They initially asked: “If you could spend Christmas Day Anywhere, where would it be?” The top 5 most popular answers were:

1. At home with family
2. Rent a large house for a family get-together
3. Go somewhere hot
4. Escape with a loved one to a cottage
5. At a hotel with everything taken care of

The team at Blue Chip Holidays then asked: “What would you rather do on Christmas day?” The respondents could choose from 3 options, the answers can be found below.

• Traditional Christmas celebrations – 58%
• Taking part in outdoor activities – 36%
• Volunteering – 6%

Interested by the popularity of ‘taking part in outdoor activities’, the team then asked those respondents “What outdoor activities would you like to do? The top 5 most popular answers were:

1. Cycling
2. Swimming
3. Surfing
4. Rambling
5. Skiing

Speaking about the results Tori Kirwan-Taylor, Brand & Communications Manager of bluechipholidays.co.uk said:

“We can see from our own figures, more people are looking to get away and spend Christmas day away from the home, whether that’s to do something different or to just hold a massive get-together with all their family in a home other than their own. “

She added:

“Christmas can be a stressful time with many parents feeling pressure to create the ‘perfect’ Christmas for children, family and friends, so it’s understandable that some people just don’t want to get involved in the over commercialisation of Christmas and are choosing instead to spend Christmas Day doing something a bit different.”

Holiday home market leaders, Blue Chip Holidays are based in Devon and were founded in 2000, they offer a range of unique properties not just across Devon and Cornwall but the rest of England, providing a quality service.