This is the second article in a four-part series to be released by Nina & Pinta consultants this week. Keep an eye out for upcoming pieces by Mark Williams and Garth Jopling. To read Jo Lloyd’s #1 Reduced Service follow the links at the bottom of this page.
One of the most surprising observations of the COVID-19 led travel industry shutdown has been the shock and surprise expressed by a number of commentators at the severity and intensity of the impact and potential consequences of the crisis.
It’s not as if we couldn’t have seen this coming. Bill Gates predicted that global contagion would represent the biggest threat to the global economy some five years ago (https://youtu.be/6Af6b_wyiwI). Hindsight is a glorious thing but even with precursors like SARS, 9/11 and the 2010 volcanic ash cloud, the travel industry was unprepared for the hard stop of COVID-19.
Many are now coming to see this as an opportunity for business travel to finally shed some of the antiquated process and financial models of the last 50 years and create instead modern, solution-orientated business models for the next decade and beyond.
Plato said necessity is the mother of invention. In order to cope with the COVID-19 crisis, corporates and travel suppliers have had to usher in a number of changes very quickly. We’re talking simplification of business processes, reconfiguration of tech stacks, upgrades to policies and altered work behaviours. Traveller confidence is at an all-time low and the financial basis for many relationships in the value chain need to be redefined urgently and sensitively. More…
