Travel has a beneficial and healthy effect. SetraWorld gives an overview of the most important feel-good factors for on the road.

In purely scientific terms, feeling good is the positive result from external conditions,” says Vincent Thess from Daimler Buses’ design department. “These include factors like the sense of space, fresh air, light, ambient temperature and a certain order.” A coach’s equipment and design thus play a crucial role in the view of the designer. The holiday finally starts with getting onto the coach.

To make this occasion as pleasant as possible for the passengers, the committed vehicle designers plan many feel-good moments in the Setra coach: from the panoramic window and glass roof, which let in lots of light and grant wide views, to scent generators, which diffuse discreet aromas, through to ergonomically optimised seats, which you can drop into and relax. The design of the interior with harmoniously combined colours and pleasant-feeling surfaces also contribute to the feeling of well-being.

Not to be underestimated in wide-bodied vehicles are safety-related elements too. Continuous handrails when climbing aboard or the lighting of corridors and steps give the passengers a feeling of safety. “An important feel-good factor when we have to find our way in unfamiliar surroundings,” says psychologist Dr Ilona Bürgel as well. “The safer we feel, the easier it is to adapt to the new situation and relax.”

For Bürgel, besides the coach itself there are many other factors that positively influence our well-being during coach travel, such as distractions. “When we learn or experience something new, we release dopamine, a feel-good hormone, which helps us to relax and enjoy life,” as Ilona Bürgel knows. An interesting itinerary thus works like a “little feel-good factor”. The impressions of a new environment, new moods and cultures stimulate the synapses, link smells with memories, engrave images in the mind and stimulate hormonal balance and metabolism.

The communicative aspect is also important: a coach trip provides the ideal opportunity to come into contact with other people. Fostering sociability and the group experience are therefore important feel-good factors for Jörn Frenzel of Frenzel-Reisen KG. Doing activities together – be it a gala dinner, a visit to a musical or museum – provides plenty of things to talk about and creates new relationships.

“Distraction and variety also includes passengers having time to themselves now and then,” stresses Jörn Frenzel. Reading a book is one of the best ways to relax for 55 per cent of Germans. And every second German puts watching TV or films, listening to music and surfing the Internet on the list of personal feel-good factors. Media in general play a major part in people’s welfare. In the Setra S 517 HD operated by Frenzel-Reisen KG, the media router with Wi-Fi and individually available media is part of the basic equipment with good reason.

For psychologist Bürgel, the arrangement and weighting of the feelgood factors can be “individually very different” depending on the coach operator’s business model. “Those who are aware of the feel-good factors and how they are related can actively increase the satisfaction of the passengers.”