Three-quarters of a huge industry is a huge industry. With messy year-over-omicron first-quarter comparisons behind it, corporate travel has settled in to its traditional single-digit percentage growth pattern and is now at about 75 percent of its pre-pandemic self. It’s been there for most of 2023. American Express Global Business Travel on Tuesday said transactions…
Capturing pre-trip data from bookings made directly is one way to deal with American Airlines’ planned distribution fragmentation in April. Some see it as merely a backup plan. It likely requires change management and communications to corporate travelers. A leading player in this area, Traxo, in December got an endorsement from the largest corporate travel…
Before the pandemic, American Airlines crowed about adding to its sales force and growing market share in corporate travel. Conditions have changed. Both corporate travel and airline capacity growth are depressed. Improving profitability and paying down debt are top priorities. After cutting back last year on customer benefits including perks and discounts, now AA is saying goodbye to its…
Despite strong underlying demand, slowly recovering business travel, constrained capacity and rising costs, business airfares slipped in 2022. There are indications that fare growth in 2023 will be modest, at least in North America. American Express Global Business Travel in December said it anticipated a roughly 3 percent increase for corporate airfares within the region…
[UPDATE, Jan. 26, 2023: This article did not properly describe ARC’s Direct Connect initiative; its definition is updated below.] We start with some good news. ARC president and CEO Lauri Reishus told attendees to The Beat Live in December that the pandemic caused fewer travel agency closings than ARC had anticipated. Back in 2020, Reishus…
To achieve their retailing ambitions, airlines don’t just want to control distribution. Optimizing payments is also critical, according to some observers. Alternative models, methods and technologies that could help are in development, but the rise of rivals to the card has been predicted before. “Corporations seeking price breaks in markets where they influence load factors…
The business travel recovery is slipping as the year winds down. After a flattening in the spring and a pop in early fall, industry data in recent weeks showed declining volumes relative to 2019’s baseline. The rapid rebound in early 2022 is a memory and corporate volumes remain well below the peak from three years…
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