What's going on with the airlines right now? That was a question my client asked me today. I replied, quickly, what do you mean? Gas Prices? He said no, I can’t even get a flight from Alabama to Las Vegas this weekend. The only thing available is 4 different legs that would take me all day and night to make happen. Yikes- those airlines are lean and mean I thought.
No, he said I thought since you were in hospitality that you would know something happening in travel right now affecting availability... I started to think, yea, I am in hospitality, I should know exactly what is going on…
He said someone at the airport told him that spring break is up and that many kids are not going to Mexico they are staying domestic and therefore capacity to these “spring break” friendly markets are getting pounded. Seems reasonable to me, considering that I live in Lake Buena Vista Florida, the happiest place on earth and traffic seems good, and we can also see through Your Brand Voice work that the social media buzz in Panama City Beach easily exceeding last year’s pace.
I started to think, how is this going to impact our meetings business in 2011 and 2012. Right now is the booking window for many of our corporate meeting clients for 2012 and lift costs are the #1 driving factor when narrowing down a market for a large annual meeting. We like to think hotels or venues are the driving factor, but they really don’t drive the decision for most meetings and events.
Better domestic demand, surging gas prices generating a perfect storm in travel which depends on which way you look at it, can be good or bad.
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