Corporate Travel Got Even More Complicated in 2017

From a controversial U.S. travel ban to questions about the implementation of Brexit to a devastating Atlantic hurricane season, the past year required business travelers to adapt and change course, sometimes at a moment’s notice. At the same time, global economic growth finally looks healthy a decade after the financial crisis, according to the Skift 2018 Global Travel Market Outlook. High consumer and business confidence is likely to motivate businesses to hire employees and to encourage them to travel. Skift asked executives in corporate travel — travel management companies, technology providers, organizations, and others — what affected their business in 2017 and the biggest industry breakthroughs this year. We also asked about their priorities for 2018, which will appear in a story in the coming weeks. They responded by email and in phone interviews. A Year of Surprises While tropical storms and other natural disasters are to be expected every year, many executives said one of the biggest shocks in 2017 was the extraordinary hurricane activity in the Atlantic. The region recorded 17 named storms, the highest number of named hurricanes since 2005. Together, they caused an estimated $188 billion or more in damages, according to AccuWeather. “I don’t think anyone foresaw the scope of the Atlantic hurricane season, and it caught quite a few people and companies by surprise,” said Gabe Rizzi, chief sales officer and president of Travel Leaders Corporate. Both leisure and business travelers saw their plans disrupted. The Caribbean is a popular destination for meetings and events, Rizzi noted, “and the strong hurricane season caused a domino effect for air travel.” Travel Leaders Corporate worked both to move travelers out of danger and to transport employees to affected areas to help with cleanup or to maintain business operations. In addition, corporate travel executives had to scramble to deal with an outbreak in Madagascar of the plague, a disease from the Middle Ages that killed more than 200 people in the country from August to mid-November. “Who would have thought you neede