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Have We Seen a Shift in the Perception of Business Travel?

The COVID-19 pandemic didn’t officially stall all business travel, but much of the world’s business has been conducted remotely for more than a year. So, with reopening underway, has there now been a shift in the way we perceive the necessity of traveling for business? MarketScale Say Yes to Travel host Sarah Dandashy weighed in….

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The COVID-19 pandemic didn’t officially stall all business travel, but much of the world’s business has been conducted remotely for more than a year.

So, with reopening underway, has there now been a shift in the way we perceive the necessity of traveling for business? MarketScale Say Yes to Travel host Sarah Dandashy weighed in.

“Have we seen the shift in the perception of business travel? I think so. I definitely think so.

Very famously, last year, at the end of 2020, Bill Gates actually came out saying that this was the death of business travel. But what we’ve seen since then is, absolutely, we will be going back to business travel now.

It is a longer sort of runway for us to get back to those numbers that we saw before, and maybe we don’t ever quite see the exact same numbers, but I think we will. We are creatures of habit.

People can always argue that in-person meetings are invaluable. So, business travel will certainly rebound. It’s just going to go at a slower pace, especially as, right now, things are still very, very fluid in regards to the pandemic.

At the end of the day, it comes down to liability, and businesses want to be careful what they’re liable for. So, it will come back, it’ll just be that slow sort of recovery. But I know that people are excited to get back out there and to travel for business.”

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Video TranscriptExpand ↓

And in our last question here, have we seen the shift in the perception of business travel? I think so. I definitely think so. Very famously last year at the end of 2020 to Bill Gaetz actually came out saying that this was like the death of business travel. But what we've seen since then is absolutely we will be going back to business travel now. It is a longer sort of runway for us to get back to those numbers that we saw before and maybe we don't ever quite see the exact same numbers. I think we will. We are creatures of habit. People can always argue that in-person meetings are invaluable. So business travel will certainly rebound. It's just going to go at a slower pace, especially as right now things are still very, very fluid in regards to the pandemic. And at the end of the day, it comes down to liability and businesses want to be careful what they're liable for. So it will come back. It'll just be sort of that slow sort of recovery. But I know that people are excited to get back out there and to travel for business. So there you have it. Those are my answers for today's questions. Hopefully you like them. See you later.

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