Without TikTok, Saint Honoré, a donut and pizza shop in Las Vegas, or Vivoli Gelateria, a shop in Florence, Italy known for its fancy affogatos, might not be on the lists of travelers now queuing at square for their treats.
“The majority of our customers come from TikTok,” said Alexandra Lourdes, 40, owner of Saint Honoré. “We rely solely on it for our small business marketing here in Las Vegas and we’re very nervous about losing business.”
And Ryan Gough, 40, may never have stayed at the five-star Waldorf Astoria in Cabo San Lucas, Mexico. Campo “wasn’t on my radar at all,” said Mr. Goff, the director of social media and marketing for a Baltimore-based marketing firm called MGH, but a single video on the app convinced him to cancel his trip.
But with the United States ban taking effect as soon as Sunday, some 170 million American users could lose access to TikTok, closing off a key outlet for an influencer industry and denying its followers a path to their discoveries, to for better or worse.
Travel is one of the sectors that has been deeply affected by the app. Since TikTok started growing in popularity in 2019, there have been 56.5 million #travel posts and it has unleashed a flood of new trends: couples seen hopping from the airport to the beach, frequent flyers sharing travel hacks and people who are filmed dancing in the mirrors they often pass on their travels.
According to TikTok, 59 percent of North American users have found travel inspiration on the app, with its algorithm consistently serving users relevant videos for both global travel destinations and under-the-radar gems. While some of these posts will naturally make it to platforms like YouTube and Instagram Reels, influencers and travel experts are wondering how the ban might change current trends.
MGH is one of several places that have conducted research on how TikTok has reshaped the travel industry.
“On a platform like Google or TripAdvisor, it’s so overwhelming in terms of the amount of content, the amount of suggestions and not knowing what’s real versus what’s paid for,” said Mr. Goff. “It’s really hard to cut through that clutter, versus a platform like TikTok, where it’s presented to you in a very clean form by people who are considered very credible.”
Jennifer Gay, 44, started making TikToks about Las Vegas in 2021 under the name @vegasstarfish. She currently has 1.7 million followers on the app, who flock to her for advice on the best buffets, clean hotel rooms and local entertainment, but worries the ban will hurt local businesses that can’t afford international ones. marketing campaigns.
“TikTok is unique in that it’s not pay-to-play — you don’t have to promote a video to see it,” said Ms. Gay. “You post it and if the food looks great, if the content looks great, if they’re doing something really special, it has a very good chance of reaching millions of people.”
Once Ms. Gay posts about a business on her account, it’s not uncommon for them to sell out of food or have lines stretching across the block. This immediate boom in business helped underground shows like “The Magician’s Study,” restaurants like With Love, Always and The Pepper Club, and Mexican snack shop Un Poko Krazy, among many others. In this way, he sees TikTok as a vital way to shake up the local tourism industry.
Although she will continue to post her videos on nearly a dozen other platforms, Ms. Gay is sure that many small tourism-oriented businesses would go out of business without TikTok.
“I’m in the community that Keith Lee is from,” said Ms. Gay — referring to the hugely influential food critic with 16.8 million TikTok followers who sample takeout meals in his car — “has single-handedly saved hundreds of businesses . I put my numbers in the tens.”
Even travel influencers outside the US are worried about how the ban will affect their work.
Jorden Tually, 31, is an Australian travel creator who travels the world in a signature orange baseball cap and takes requests from his 3.7 million followers on TikTok. He said a quarter of his followers are based in the US and many of his sponsorship deals are as well. Without their access to TikTok, he worries that people in the United States won’t be able to find travel content in the same ways.
Mr. Tually said one of the things that sets the app apart is its search capability. “If you’re looking on YouTube, you’re looking for something specific,” he said. “If you’re looking on Instagram, it’s just not going to work. But if you’re searching on TikTok, you can put in, for example, ‘epic travel destinations’ and then search based on what went viral in the last week.”
A possible silver lining: “Maybe you’re not going to get the onslaught of adoring tourists in certain locations that go viral on TikTok,” he said. “Like maybe some coffee shop has a ten-foot-long hot dog.”
Vivoli’s affogato caught Becky Blaine’s eye. “I kept seeing this viral affogato in Florence, where they spread the ice cream on all four sides of the cup,” Ms. Blaine, 47, senior travel editor for The Points Guy, a rewards website. travel.
The only problem?
“Look at these lines,” he said. “I don’t want to stand in those lines next time I go to Italy.”
In this sense, TikTok travel content creates a classic social media paradox: People try to post about less crowded destinations, but when their videos go viral, the destinations become the kinds of crowded places they were trying to avoid.
Folderol, a Paris ice cream parlor and natural wine bar, struggled when it was flooded with TikTokers in early 2023. Its owners, Jessica Yang and Robert Compagnon, eventually had to post signs on the door prohibiting customers from using TikTok.
“They don’t even taste the ice cream,” said Ms. Young to the Times in 2023. “They just let it melt in a bowl of melting liquid and die in the sun.”
And while the TikTok ban may cause a temporary shift in the travel sector, there’s no doubt that short travel content will find a new home soon enough.
“At the end of the day, the show must go on,” said Mr. Tually, who also publishes his content on YouTube and Instagram. “The only thing potentially good for TikTok dying is another platform being created.”
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