Industry-wide price rises and future predictions

This Monday’s Insights (15th August) feature brings you a selection of recent industry headlines, including increase in industry-wide prices in 2023, potential city hosts announced for 2023 Eurovision and 480,000 plastic bottles saved at Birmingham Commonwealth Games.

Headlines

Business travellers to see industry-wide fare rises in 2023

According to the 2023 Global Business Travel Forecast, global travel prices are predicted to continue to increase in Q3 and Q4 of 2022 and throughout 2023.

Published by CWT and the Global Business Travel Association (GBTA), the forecast covers the drivers behind the increasing prices.

The report suggests this is due to rising fuel prices, labour shortages, and inflationary pressures in raw material costs.

What does this mean for meetings and events?

Prices have increased in all regions across most categories of spend, fuelled by pent-up demand. The cost-per-attendee for meetings and events in 2022 is expected to be around 25% higher than in 2019 and is forecast to rise a further 7% in 2023.

Corporate events are also now competing with other types of events that were cancelled in 2020. With many companies having given up office space during the pandemic in favour of remote working, they are now booking meeting spaces when staff gather in person.

Read more via Conference News here.

UK hotel rates reached record levels during the second quarter, due to rising demand and inflationary cost pressures.

A report byBNP Paribas Real Estate found that the UK’s average hotel occupancy rate rose to 80 per cent in Q2, up from 70 per cent in the first quarter of the year.

Further insight available via Business Travel News Europe.

Eurovision song contest 2023: seven UK cities named as potential hosts

Birmingham, Glasgow, Leeds, Liverpool, Manchester, Newcastle and Sheffield have been named as potential hosts of the 2023 Eurovision song contest when it is held in the UK for the first time in 25 years.

All great cities, but where do you think it should be held? Share your thoughts on our LinkedIn post.

Double Take

480,000 plastic bottles saved by Severn Trent at Birmingham 2022 Commonwealth Games

Severn Trent has announced that around 480,000 reusable water bottles were filled over the 11 days of the 2022 Commonwealth Games, having run refill stations at every Games venue.

Spectators, Games volunteers and emergency services staff were kept hydrated during the Games as the water company looked to tackle single-use plastic waste.

Counters installed on the water refill stations kept track of the number of plastic bottles saved, with the initiative helping to save people money on their memorable days out as they took in the excitement of each event.

As Official Nature and Carbon Neutral Partner of Birmingham 2022, Severn Trent had 248 taps in operation across the 41 water refill stations, with more than 800 volunteers from the company on hand to help and answer any questions spectators may have.