Waiting & Watching
With the elections just a week away, the travel industry is beginning to not only feel the results of a bad economy, but they are beginning to come out of the closet and speak about it — upfront and honest.
I have not only read more about the concerns of our industry but have also heard from associates and friends that layoffs and cutbacks are happening now. Suppliers must prepare for a long, cold winter in so many ways. However, now might be just the time to gather the team and strategically plan for actually doing additional and frequent targeted marketing; thus taking advantage of a down situation and creating a distraction that will turn into results at a time when others have cut their marketing spend. Getting a leg up on the competition never hurt anyone.
Cut back where necessary, but keep creativity and bold moves up front. We will weather this storm as we have in the past even though it may take a bit longer, and your future success may ultimately depend on what your company does right now!
This just in from NBTA:
As a part of its ongoing effort to keep the business travel community informed about the impact of the financial crisis and economic downturn in the United States, NBTA surveyed 320 travel managers to find out how this situation is affecting their travel programs. Top-level findings of the NBTA surveys indicate:
The majority, about 50% of respondents, are reporting a mild impact on their companies.
A higher number of companies, more than 55%, are reporting a higher impact on their travel programs.
56% of the buyers feel confident about meeting their agreed levels of spend with their suppliers.
For 2009, a similar percentage of buyers (56%) have no intentions of scaling back on quotas agreed with travel suppliers.
By Frances Kiradjian, Publisher, TravelMole North America
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