Sino-Singapore Jingwei, March 5th (Zhao Jiaran) "It's too difficult to book a hotel these two days!" Mr. Yang, who is doing administrative work in Huilongguan, Beijing, has been making phone calls for three consecutive days in order to book a hotel for people who come to Beijing on business trips.

He said that the hotels that signed the agreement with the company were full of rooms in recent days, and he had to find a new hotel, but he asked several hotels within the Fourth Ring Road that there were not enough rooms left.

  Not only are hotel rooms difficult to book, but travel prices are also rising.

"During the epidemic a few years ago, our company negotiated an agreement with many surrounding hotels, about 60-30% off; now we can talk about 30-20% off at most. Unlike the previous unified settlement amount at the end of the year, many hotels now require payment in advance Part of the advance payment, or the customer should pay by himself, otherwise the agreement cannot be signed." Mr. Yang said.

  After the Spring Festival holiday, all enterprises have fully resumed work and production, and migrant workers have also ushered in "retaliatory business trips".

How is the business travel market currently recovering?

Which industries are the most active in business travel?

We chatted with people in the industry.

"The number of business trips in a month is more than in the past three years"

  "I have just booked a hotel, and my business trips for the next month are already full." Mr. Jiang, 38, works as an after-sales manager for a large machinery manufacturing company in Shanghai.

He told Sino-Singapore Jingwei that in the past three years, he rarely traveled across provinces, and in the last month, he was either on a business trip or preparing for a business trip.

  As Mr. Jiang serves customers all over the country, business trips are a very important part for Mr. Jiang.

"According to the company's regulations, some core major customers need us to visit once every three months to half a year. The significance of business trips is to understand customer needs and pain points face-to-face, and open up potential markets. During the epidemic, the company requires no non-essential travel. 3-4 times a month has been reduced to almost zero. Now that the company’s policy has returned to normal, customers who haven’t seen each other in a few years will naturally have to pay close attention to repairing the relationship. Very frequent.

I took 7 business trips last month, which took up more than half a month, more times than the previous three years combined.

  With the rapid increase in the business travel demand of various companies, the recent business travel business of various hotels has ushered in a significant boost.

  "Since January, the occupancy rate of our hotel has started to increase, and in February it has increased sharply, and the occupancy rate has remained above 90% on some dates." During the interview, he said that since the epidemic prevention and control was lifted, the hotel business has recovered better than expected, and the business travel business has also recovered significantly.

  Zhong Yong said that since Beijing International Trade Hotel is located in the business center area, the number of business travel customers received is relatively higher.

"From the end of 2022 to the beginning of 2023, we experienced a trough in the hotel business; after the fifteenth day of the first lunar month, the company officially resumed work and production, and the demand for business trips to Beijing increased significantly

. Most of the guests are from the financial, banking, investment, and real estate industries

. At the same time, bookings for large-scale business meetings are also increasing, and there are currently weekly meetings.”

  Zhou Lijuan, general manager of the business development department of Jinjiang Hotel (China), told Sino-Singapore Jingwei that after the Spring Festival in 2023, the business travel market will recover significantly.

According to the operating data of Jin Jiang Hotel (China),

business travel bookings in first-tier cities such as Beijing, Guangzhou, and Shenzhen in February 2023 increased by nearly 60% month-on-month, and the overall occupancy rate has also exceeded 11% in the same period in 2019.

Among them, the new first-tier and provincial capital cities represented by Chengdu, Wuhan, Hefei, and Nanjing have become hot business travel destinations recently, and business travel bookings have increased by nearly 40% month-on-month.

  She said that the needs of business travelers are becoming more and more diverse.

"Not only booking air tickets, hotels, special cars and other services, but also catering, conferences, leisure vacations, etc. are also important links in business travel services. In addition, the current trend of high-end in the overall hotel market is obvious, but the number of small and medium-sized enterprises still occupies an absolute advantage, and the number of employees There is also a relatively large gap in business travel standards. In this regard, mid-range and budget hotels also need to meet their different needs in a targeted manner." Regarding the outlook for the future market, Zhou Lijuan said that at present, it is expected that the summer business travel market in 2023 will It will return to the level before the epidemic as a whole.

  Talking about the degree of recovery of business travel business, Zhong Yong said that due to the gradual increase of international flights, business travel business has not yet fully recovered to the pre-epidemic level.

"Now the hotel will also receive foreign business travelers. Although the number is still small, it will gradually increase with the resumption of flights. I believe that with the increase of domestic and international business activities in the future, the hotel's business travel business will continue to improve."

Hotel reservations by the end of the year Business travel demand picks up more than expected

  "Retaliatory business trips" to stimulate consumption are also clearly reflected on travel platforms.

According to the Ctrip platform,

the overall growth of business travel hotels in February was 130% year-on-year, of which the domestic growth was about 125%, and the international growth was nearly 10 times.

Compared with large enterprises such as state-owned enterprises and foreign enterprises, small and medium-sized enterprises are the fastest to achieve positive growth, an increase of more than 10% compared with January 2020 before the epidemic.

  In terms of classification, the travel demand of the information technology service industry, trade and manufacturing, machinery and equipment, medicine and other industries is very prominent, among which the trade and manufacturing and pharmaceutical industries have returned to the pre-epidemic level.

In addition, the demand for business visas has also increased significantly, and most of the travel time is concentrated in the first half of 2023. The main destinations are Japan, Thailand, Singapore, South Korea, and Indonesia.

  "

Recently, the overall growth curve of business travel hotels is relatively regular. It will reach a peak every Monday, and this cycle will repeat itself.

From the perspective of time, the longest hotel bookings have been booked until December, but more still Concentrate in March and April." The relevant person in charge of Ctrip Business Travel told Sino-Singapore Jingwei.

  "

It is expected that in 2023, the business travel demand in China's domestic sinking market will become more significant. At the same time, the demand for international business travel will rebound strongly.

Ctrip's current international flight ticket volume has recovered to 70% of the level before the epidemic, compared with 2022. The growth rate exceeds 500%. Looking forward to the new year after crossing the 'hill', China's domestic and international business travel markets can flourish." said the above-mentioned person in charge.

  Industry analysts believe that the business travel market will usher in a significant rebound in 2023.

Galaxy Securities analysts said in a research report that the rapid recovery of business travel after the Spring Festival has driven the unexpected recovery of hotel operating data.

In the medium and long term, the medium and long-term supply, demand, and competition pattern of the hotel industry are relatively clear. The leading hotel groups benefit from the clearing of supply + light asset expansion + mid-to-high-end upgrades, and are the biggest beneficiaries of the post-epidemic industry recovery.

  Caitong Securities stated that the demand for business travel has recently recovered beyond expectations. The number of full rooms and RevPAR (average revenue per available room) in first-tier cities such as Beijing and Shanghai exceeded the same period in 2019.

Second-tier provincial capital cities such as Chengdu and Hangzhou also performed well, mainly due to the recovery of economic activities this year, the substantial release of demand for large-scale conferences and exhibitions, and the advance schedule.

The increase in the proportion of mid-to-high-end hotels and the shortage of supply in the industry have driven up the volume and price of hotels, bringing about upward flexibility in performance.

(Sino-Singapore Jingwei APP)