Germany-based business travellers are now taking fewer but longer trips than they did before the pandemic, according to the annual Business Travel Report by the country’s corporate travel association VDR.
The 20th edition of VDR’s report, published this week, found that the popularity of the one-day business trip has been “waning” since 2020, with the average length of time away from the office now being at least two days. This trend was especially true for small and midsized enterprises (SMEs).
VDR vice-president Inge Pirner added: “Business travellers now tend to travel less often but for longer, pooling several business trips together.”
The report added that the work of travel buyers and managers was becoming “increasingly complex”, as they take on new responsibilities in areas such as digitalisation, safety and sustainability.
This is being driven by a desire by more organisations to combine the “numerous responsibilities involved in managing corporate mobility into one place”.
Sustainability is also becoming “increasingly relevant” for travel managers and TMCs, particularly among larger organisations where 82 per cent are receiving support from their TMCs on making their travel more sustainable.
The picture is somewhat different for SMEs - 28 per cent of firms with less than 500 employees said that sustainability reporting was still “not an issue” for them.
Issues remain about the many different methods of calculating the carbon footprint of travel. As a result, VDR has set up an expert sustainability team with the aim of finding a “uniform method of investigation and prompt implementation”.
The association also points out how a “gap remains between ambition and action” when it comes to implementing measures to protect the environment and climate.
“Following a significant rise in commitment to sustainability issues from 2020 to 2021, developments in this field stalled or suffered a slight decline in 2022,” said VDR in its report.
The number of firms that said they were reducing or planning to reduce the number of business trips was 83 per cent in this report, which was a slight fall from 87 per cent in the previous year’s study.
VDR noted that switching from air to rail travel for journeys within Germany was now the “norm”, with 62 per cent of firms already doing this and another 14 per cent planning to do so in the future.
Pirner summarised: “The crisis in the travel industry is creating an opportunity for a new start with stronger sustainable perspectives for the future – it’s back to business but not business as usual.”
Another trend identified in the VDR report is around the “accelerated” digitalisation of communication and collaboration as new flexible and hybrid working patterns continue. More than half of companies (54 per cent) said they now allowed their employees to choose their place of work with some restrictions.