Road Warrior: Overseas Aggravation
October 01, 2007
The weak U.S. dollar is hampering international meetings
By Elissa Hunter
Even as the world becomes smaller and companies have increasingly global travel management capabilities, the majority of companies still do not have a meetings management program in place outside of the United States, and many expect international cost per attendee to increase, according to new Meetings Today data.
In an exclusive survey of 134 corporate meeting buyers, 49 percent of respondents said they expected their cost per attendee for meetings outside the United States to remain the same this year, while 48 percent expected the cost to increase. Only 3 percent expected the cost to decrease.
Additionally, 76 percent of respondents said their company did not have a meetings management program in place for meetings outside of the United States. However, 16 percent said they had a program in place, while an additional 8 percent did not have a program in place last year, but were planning on implementing one in 2007. Nearly 84 percent of respondents will hold fewer than 10 meetings outside the United States in 2007, and 75 percent expect the number to hold steady from last year.
The increase in cost per attendee can be attributed to the U.S. dollar's weakness against the euro and the British pound. Many cities in Europe not only have become more expensive due to the the exchange rate, but also because hotel demand in many markets exceeds supply.
"Europe is a very expensive market," said Bruce Morgan, senior vice president of marketing and business development for BCD Meetings & Incentives. He added that many of his company's clients are looking to South and Latin America, where exchange rates with the dollar are more favorable. The exchange rate is "the biggest reason we're not selling more to Europe. Everybody would like to go to Europe, but they'll default to somewhere in the Americas," said Scott Graf, global president of BCD Meetings & Incentives.
Even when travel stays within foreign countries, negating the effect of the exchange rate, cost per attendee still is rising. Cisco Systems, for example, has increased its number of meetings outside the United States, but those meetings are with salespeople already in those countries. "It's growing because we're expanding in emerging countries, which includes Eastern Europe and the Middle East," said Michele Snock, Cisco's global manager of meeting services. Cisco holds approximately 600 international meetings a year. "That's where meetings are growing because that's where our employees are, but we're planning out of those countries, so the dollar doesn't affect it," she said.
Even without transoceanic travel, "Hotel rates have gone up all over the place. Airfares are going up because of the expense of fuel. The expense of doing a meeting anywhere in the world has gone up for that reason," Snock said.
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