With rising prices squeezing business-event budgets in many areas, planners are increasingly basing their venue and service-vendor choices on “value for money” while focusing less on sustainability factors.
This is according to the International Planner Sentiment Report from The Power of Events, a U.K.-based industry think tank. Its May survey got responses from 1,026 planners within corporate, association, agency, and incentive organizations across North America and Europe.
Compared to last year’s survey, cost considerations and value for money tracked a full point higher in importance on a 1-to-10 scale in all regions, reflecting rising event costs and pressure on overall budgets due to high inflation and strong demand at business-focused hotels.
Further, the report notes that “the biggest and most surprising change this year is the reduced importance of sustainability as a key decision factor, with this tracking about 1.5 points lower on average across the U.K. and Europe” and a full point lower among North American respondents.
Another other interesting finding: A notable increase in planners’ focus on “destination brand,” which rose a full point in importance among planners versus last year. This finding reflects the need for event hosts to market the unique experiences delegates will have in a given destination, according to the report.
Good News: Air-Travel Costs Down, Capacity Up
One event-related cost that is moving in a friendly direction for meetings is airfare. In June, the average domestic fare was 5.1 percent lower than a year earlier and 5.7 percent lower than the month prior, according to the Consumer Price Index report released on July 11.
Additional seat capacity is a central reason why fares have dropped. For instance, Delta Airlines CEO Ed Bastion said during the company’s quarterly financial press conference this week that the carrier expects six-percent growth in seat capacity in the third quarter compared with Q3 2023, after growing its capacity by eight percent in Q2.
In addition, American Airlines said in May it would expand its capacity by 3.5 percent in the second half of the year, after increasing capacity by more than seven percent in the first half of 2024.
