Integrating a company’s transient travel and meetings can seem daunting, but it doesn’t have to be an all-or-nothing proposition. Some of the biggest companies in the world are taking evolutionary steps toward an integrated travel and meetings strategy in search of the savings, increased control and improved traveler satisfaction that integration promises.
Come Together: Integrating Your Corporate Travel and Meetings Programs, a new paper from BCD Travel consulting arm Advito, documents the trend among the Corporate Travel 100, Business Travel News’ annual list of the 100 biggest buyers of travel in the U.S. Using recent analysis by BCD M&I, the paper shows:
88 of the CT100 had the core elements of a strategic meetings model and were actively managing their meetings spend
79 had a group air program and had already negotiated airline discounts for their meetings travel
17 were approaching fully integrated travel and meetings in which they had already aligned several elements, such as combining their supplier programs
24 had started integration by combining some of the components of an integrated program, such as merging their meetings and transient reporting
51 were in the early stages of considering integration and were looking at the potential benefits—trying to understand if they were missing out by not aggregating data
The analysis tells us that U.S. large spenders are moving along an evolutionary path toward integration. They’ve gotten started first because:
- Large-volume companies spend big on both meetings and travel, so they can clearly see the benefits of integration—and they have the resources to tackle it.
- Mature travel programs tend to breed mature strategic meetings programs. With both in place, buyers naturally turn to integration as a source for new savings.
- Meetings programs are easier to implement in the U.S., thanks to a single language and single currency.
Come Together: Integrating Your Corporate Travel and Meetings Programs delves into lessons learned from these integration pioneers. It’s a primer on the small and large steps any size company can take toward integration—and why your company should get started now.