Ovation Travel Group Releases 2020 Annual Business Travel Index

NEW YORK, March 16, 2020 /PRNewswire-PRWeb/ -- Ovation Travel Group, one of the largest independently owned travel management companies in the US, has published its Annual Business Travel Index, providing a snapshot of the past 5 years' worth of business travel average prices paid for air and hotel as well as domestic and international travel patterns. The Index covers 5 unique corporate travel benchmarking groups (Cross-Industry, Financial Services Firm Industry, Law Firm Industry, Biotech & Healthcare Industry and Technology Industry) so that individualized results can be compared year-over-year as well as industry-to-industry.

The Index also includes a year-over-year analysis of "Negotiated Hotel Room Rates by City" which takes a city-by-city look at negotiated hotel room rates in the top hotel markets for Ovation's proprietary Preferred Hotel Partners Program showing either average percentage increase or decrease in a city's negotiated room rates, year-over-year for 2020, 2019 and 2018, as compared to each preceding year.

Visit https://www.ovationtravel.com/lp-2020-annual-business-travel-index to download Ovation's 2020 Annual Business Travel Index.

The Annual Index contains 5 years of data findings, illustrating the following year-over-year statistics:

• Average airfare price paid Domestically and Internationally
• Average hotel rate paid Domestically and Internationally
• Percentage breakdown of Domestic and International travel patterns
• Percentage increase/decrease for negotiated hotel room rates in top hotel markets Domestically and Internationally

Ovation utilizes this high-level analysis to identify trends and to benchmark individual client activity against a 'yardstick' representing over $1.4 billion (Cross-Industry Business Travel Index), $74 million (Financial Services Firm Business Travel Index), $220 million (Law Firm Business Travel Index), $55 million (Technology Industry Business Travel Index) and $22 million (Biotech & Healthcare Industry Business Travel Index) in annual air and hotel spend. The data serves as a resource in determining opportunities for strengthening clients' travel programs in such areas as travel policy adjustment, service enhancements and supplier negotiations.

"We didn't see big shifts in airfare or hotel average prices paid in 2019 for any of the industry benchmarking groups," noted Executive Vice President, Michael Steiner. "In fact, for our Cross-Industry benchmarking group which represents Ovation's entire corporate client base, the domestic airfare shift down was $1 per transaction, the domestic hotel rate shift up was $1 and the international hotel rate paid stayed the same, on average. In terms of international travel, prices appear to have softened last year on the whole, with both average airfares and average hotel rates paid in 2019 mostly down year-over-year for most of the industry benchmarking groups. Looking at these recent annual trends is always valuable for client benchmarking, but what's obviously topmost on everyone's minds right now is how the industry is going to be affected over the course of 2020 with world events such as Brexit and the upcoming US election expected to have some effect on the travel industry. And, of course, the current situation with the COVID-19 coronavirus is already impacting travel to certain destinations and is a rapidly evolving situation with repercussions on travel. It remains to be seen how significant those repercussions will be in 2020 and beyond."

Ovation Travel Group is an independently owned, $1.4 billion travel management company with experienced travel consultants in more than 30 locations throughout the United States and United Kingdom. Ovation serves over 700 clients from industries including advertising, architecture, biotechnology, consulting firms, entertainment, financial services, healthcare, law, media, not for profit, technology and more. Ovation's law firm-focused company, Lawyers Travel, serves over 200 law firm clients. Data for these Indexes was culled from all corporate client booking data as well as a cross-industry-sample of clients within each of the individual industry areas.

To download Ovation's 2020 Annual Business Travel Index visit https://www.ovationtravel.com/lp-2020-annual-business-travel-index.

SOURCE Ovation Travel Group