Priceline.com Reports That Americans Are Heading North to Beat the Heat for July 4th Holiday

NORWALK, Conn., June 23, 2011 /PRNewswire/ -- Priceline.com (Nasdaq: PCLN) today released its annual survey of the 50 most-popular destinations for the upcoming Independence Day weekend.  Chicago's North Michigan Avenue/River North Area is the #1 destination for July 4th travelers.  This is the second year in a row that a Chicago neighborhood has captured the top spot on priceline.com's annual list.

The Stanley Cup isn't returning to Canada this year, but American tourists certainly are.  Ten of the 50 destinations on priceline.com's list are Canadian, including Montreal, Ottawa, Toronto and Banff.  And Vancouver needn't worry about any tourism fallout after its Cup loss – the city's neighborhoods appear twice on this year's July 4th list.

Priceline's annual Top 50 Destinations list is based on hotel room booking requests made by customers using priceline.com's Name Your Own Price® hotel reservation service.  Because the survey is based on thousands of credit card-backed booking requests, and not on consumer preference polls or votes, priceline.com believes the annual survey is one of the more accurate predictors of July 4th travel trends.    

Commenting on the survey, priceline.com's in-house "Travel Ekspert" Brian Ek said, "With record high temperatures in various parts of the country, many Americans appear to be headed for hopefully cooler northern destinations over the July 4th long weekend.  This is similar to the trend we saw last year except, in 2010, it was the BP oil spill that was affecting tourism in southern beach destinations.  It's also worth noting the strong recovery of New Orleans.  For July 4th, 2010, the city was #26 on Priceline's list.  This year, it's the #2 most-popular destination for the long weekend."  

Priceline www.priceline.com said it still has reservations available for hotel rooms, airline tickets, vacation packages and rental cars for the long weekend, often at significant discounts over other online travel reservation services.  To see the special July 4th deals, visit http://travela.priceline.com/promo/deals/july4th/deals.html and, for last-minute deals,  www.priceline.com/pricebreakers/.

The Priceline Top 50 Destinations List for July 4th 2011

#1  Chicago, North Michigan Avenue and River North Area

#2  New Orleans, French Quarter

#3  Montreal, Downtown/City Center

#4  Ottawa

#5  New York City, Midtown West

#6  St. Catharines, Niagara Falls

#7  Seattle, Downtown/Pike Place

#8  Las Vegas, Strip North Area

#9  Pittsburgh, Downtown

#10  San Diego, Downtown & Harbor Island

#11  Chicago, Millennium Park, Loop & Grant Park Area

#12  San Francisco, Fisherman's Wharf

#13  Toronto, North Downtown

#14  Portland, Downtown

#15  New York City, Times Square/Theater District

#16  Buffalo, Niagara Falls

#17  Harrisburg

#18  Toronto, South Downtown

#19  Nashville, Downtown/Vanderbilt/Metro Center

#20  New York City, Upper East Side

#21  Milwaukee, Downtown

#22  Las Vegas, Strip Vicinity South

#23  St. Louis, Downtown

#24  Seattle, Seattle Center/Space Needle

#25  London, Westminster

#26  New York City, Downtown/Soho/Financial District

#27  Anchorage

#28  Montreal, Convention Center/Old Montreal

#29  Boston, Quincy Market/Faneuil Hall/ Financial District

#30  Buffalo, Airport Area

#31  Harrisburg, Harrisburg/York

#32  Charleston, Downtown

#33  Oahu, Waikiki Beach Area

#34  Seattle, Airport Area

#35  Vancouver, Downtown

#36  Atlantic City, Atlantic City/Cape May

#37  Washington, DC, Convention Center/Capitol Hill Area

#38  San Francisco, Union Square East

#39  New Orleans, Downtown Area

#40  Orange County, Newport/Huntington Beach

#41  Austin, Downtown

#42  New York City, Midtown East

#43  Banff

#44  Victoria

#45  Chicago, Greater Chicago Area

#46  Los Angeles, Santa Monica/Marina Del Rey

#47  Vancouver, Airport Area

#48  London, Hammersmith

#49  London, Mayfair/Soho

#50  Cincinnati, Downtown

About The Priceline Group of Companies

The Priceline Group of Companies (Nasdaq: PCLN) is a leader in global online hotel reservations, with over 170,000 participating hotels worldwide.  The Group is composed of four primary brands – Booking.com, priceline.com, Agoda.com and TravelJigsaw – and several ancillary brands. The Priceline Group provides online travel services in Europe, North America, South America, the Asia-Pacific region, the Middle East and Africa.

Booking.com is a leading international online hotel reservation service operating in 101 countries in 41 languages.  Booking.com offers its customers access to over 135,000 participating hotels worldwide.  Priceline.com gives leisure travelers multiple ways to save on their airline tickets, hotel rooms, rental cars, vacation packages and cruises. In addition to getting compelling published prices, travelers can take advantage of priceline.com's famous Name Your Own Price® service, which can deliver the lowest prices available.  Agoda.com is an Asia-based online hotel reservation service that offers hotel rooms around the world and is available in 32 languages.  TravelJigsaw is a multinational car hire service, offering its reservation services in more than 4,000 locations in 115 countries.  Customer support is provided in 27 languages.

SOURCE Priceline.com

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