There’s a question I’ve been asking lodge and resort owners lately, and the answers are revealing a pattern that should concern anyone thinking about the next decade of their business.
“What’s the average age of your repeat guests?”
The answers usually fall somewhere between 50 and 75.
Which makes sense. These are established and retired travelers with disposable income, vacation time, and a appreciation for the kind of authentic, personal experience that independent lodges provide.
They’re loyal. They come back year after year. They build friendships with other regular guests. They’re the foundation of a solid business.
But here’s the follow-up question that changes everything:
“In 10 years, who’s replacing them?”
The Math Nobody Wants to Do
Let’s be objective about this.
If your average repeat guest is 62 today, they’ll be 72 in ten years. Some will still be traveling actively. Many won’t be.
That’s not pessimism. That’s how the ease of travel and the cost of travel insurance changes as we age.
Back in the days of the Yellow Pages, this wouldn’t be a crisis. Word-of-mouth would naturally flow to the next generation. Your 60-year-old guests would recommend you to their friends, their adult children, their colleagues planning trips.
Except that’s not how the next generation is discovering travel destinations.
How Travelers Under 40 Actually Find Properties
Here’s what the data shows:
➤ Among Gen Z, 61% reportedly use Google for travel search, but 67% use Instagram and 62% use TikTok, indicating that social media, especially video – has become as important—or more important—than Google as a starting point for travel planning for those under 35.
➢ Approximately 40% of global travelers now use AI tools for trip planning, with 62% of Millennials and Gen Z travelers in key markets already leveraging generative AI for this purpose.
➢ Gen Z is the most engaged: 63% of Gen Z travelers in the US have used AI for trip planning—the highest among age groups, making this demographic the strongest early adopters.
➢ Millennials closely follow, with about 57% preferring AI or personalized digital planning services.
➝ Older generations are adopting AI tools as well, but at lower rates: for instance, only 18% of those aged 25–34 in the UK use AI for trip planning, compared to just 3% of those aged 55–64. *source – Perplexity
They open Google and type a question:
- “Best cabin for anniversary weekend near Thunder Bay”
- “Romantic B&B with a lakeside view on Lake of The Woods”
- “Family-friendly resort with separate cabins on Lake Ontario”
And here’s what’s changed in the last year that most property owners haven’t noticed:
➤➤ Google’s AI, YouTube Video and Google Reviews now answer these questions directly.
Before showing any traditional search results, before Airbnb or Booking.com, Google displays an AI-generated overview that recommends 3-5 specific properties by name.
It describes them. Lists their strengths. Provides direct links.
This appears at the very top of search results. It’s the first thing potential guests see.
If your property is one of those 3-5 recommendations, you’re capturing a significant share of that search traffic.
If you’re not… you’re invisible to an entire generation of travelers.
The Invisible Crisis
Here’s why this matters more than most lodge owners realize:
Your business probably feels stable right now. Your repeat guests are still booking. Your occupancy rates might even be up from last year.
But underneath that stability, there’s a quiet crisis building:
Your customer acquisition pipeline for the next 30 years is broken.
⚠️ The 30-year-olds who should be discovering your property right now—the ones who could become your loyal repeat guests for the next three decades—are finding your competitors instead.
Not because your property isn’t as good. Not because your service isn’t excellent. Not because your pricing is wrong.
Because they literally can’t find you where they search.
And here’s the compounding problem: Word-of-mouth can’t work if they never discover you in the first place.
You can’t build a relationship with guests who never knew you existed.
What This Looks Like in Real Numbers
Let’s put some numbers to this:
Say you have 100 loyal repeat guests who book with you regularly. Average age: 58.
Over the next 10 years, you’ll naturally lose 30-40% of that base to age-related travel decline.
That’s 30-40 guests you need to replace just to maintain current levels.
But if travelers under 45 can’t find you in search results, where are those replacement guests coming from?
➝ Aging word-of-mouth referrals from your existing base? That keeps you stable for maybe 3-5 more years, then the math starts working against you.
➝ Increased OTA presence? Sure, but now you’re paying 15-25% commission on bookings that could have been direct if you’d been discoverable.
➝ Traditional marketing? Expensive, and it’s swimming against the tide of how people actually search for properties now.
The Timeline Most Owners Don’t See Coming
Here’s what this looks like in practice:
At First: Everything seems fine. Repeat bookings stay strong. Maybe there’s a slight shift toward OTA bookings vs. direct, but nothing alarming.
And Slowly: You start noticing the guest base aging. Fewer new faces. More reliance on Airbnb and Booking.com to fill gaps. Commission costs creeping up.
And Suddenly: The decline becomes obvious. Repeat guests aging out faster than new ones coming in. Scrambling to figure out why younger travelers aren’t discovering you. By now, competitors have owned AI search visibility for years.
The lodge owners who will thrive in the next decade aren’t necessarily the ones with the best properties.
They’re the ones who positioned themselves across the video platforms and in the AI search results while they still had time to build relationships with the next generation.
What You Can’t Afford Not to Know
If you own a lodge or resort and most of your bookings come from repeat guests and word-of-mouth, and you’re thinking about the next 10 years of your business, you need to see this.
I’ve put together a video that shows you exactly what happens when someone searches for properties like yours today. What travelers actually see. Which properties get featured. And why most lodge owners are completely invisible to the next generation of guests.
Watch the 90-second video below, and if what you see concerns you, join my email list. I’ll send you a quick series showing you exactly how to check where your property appears in AI search results, who’s getting the visibility instead, and what it means for your future bookings.
I’m also offering complimentary visibility assessments to a limited number of lodge owners this month. Twenty-minute conversation. No cost. No pitch. Just intelligence you need to have if you’re serious about the next decade of your business.
This isn’t about a sudden need to panic. It’s about helping you see what most lodge owners can’t see yet—before the demographic shift makes it impossible to recover and the successful lodges are buying you out.
Your repeat guests are aging. That’s inevitable.
The question is: who’s in the pipeline behind them?