Corporate travel is also suffering from the pandemic. The restrictions imposed on mobility caused the activity of this segment to fall by more than 50% during 2020, with accumulated losses that exceed 6,000 million in turnover, according to data from Aervio, a platform specialized in this type of tourism.
Tras un segundo y tercer trimestre convulso, con caídas que llegaron a reach 95% in the first phase of the health crisis, this market niche began to take off timidly last September, “although still below the pre-pandemic numbers, caused in part by the increase in the share of agencies in company travel, due to the growing need for advice and savings ", they point out from the aforementioned firm.
Due to its characteristics, this type of movement Due to its characteristics, this type of movement and this is reflected in the destinations demanded. In this sense, Aervio's Marketing Manager, Hugo Van Nienwenhove, assures MANAGERS that, in addition to national and European business routes, they also have clients who have been forced to move to North America, Latin America or Africa for reasons of "health emergencies or operations for the creation or maintenance of infrastructures that cannot be postponed or managed remotely".
Despite this, the volume of investment is far quite a bit of the 12.8 billion euros accounted for in 2019, a figure that will possibly take three years to be reached again. Thus, from the aforementioned signature they trust that 2021 will be the year of recovery, 2022 that of consolidation and it will not be until 2023 when it returns to pre-COVID levels. Projections that, in any case, are subject to factors such as the vaccination rate, the evolution of telework or the possibility of holding 107 events planned in Spain for this exercise in which the safety of the attendees can be guaranteed. Among them is the International Tourism Fair (Fitur), which will take place from May 19 to 23.
In a post-COVID world, in which technology will have much more weight, the agents of the sector do not doubt that business trips will continue to be "Essential to achieve negotiations or close agreements that could be more complicated through a videoconference", they need from Aervio. Under these circumstances, Van Nienwenhove advances new needs that will gain weight within companies such as the price factor or the search for agents to help organizations in all stages of the journey, with the security and immediacy of the information of the destinations and passengers as the main requirements. "Another trend that may remain is that companies make their reservations with less advance and require more flexibility for possible changes or cancellations," he adds.
Source: https://dirigentesdigital.com/economia/que-pasara-con-los-viajes-de-negocios
