Business travel management company ATG (AllStars Travel Group) recently held its global conference in Cape Town, with MICE trends being one of the big talking points. ATG CEO Tammy Krings, who started the business three decades ago in 1995, highlights why MICE is a key part of the business and discusses its potential within the APAC region.
How does your business model work?
Corporate travel was our dominant offering, we then moved into meetings and events pretty quickly. We have franchisees around the world, all of whom are entrepreneurs who can make quick decisions, who are globally capable and also technically savvy, and with a very robust offering that includes meetings and events.
We build intimate partnerships with our team members and we now have over 62 franchisees representing more than 150 countries, with teams in Indonesia, the UK, Turkey, Singapore, for example. Some are regional in their approach and others have one operation in one country. But in all of these cases, it’s only one representative per country.
“We build intimate partnerships with our team members and we now have over 62 franchisees representing more than 150 countries, with teams in Indonesia, the UK, Turkey, Singapore…”
Our MICE offering today includes everything from basic registrations, to our own registration technology, to destination selection and production. A few of our partners have started their own production companies, recognising how very profitable this can be when you have a bespoke offering. Our team members can pool and share resources; for example, we have a team in the Nordics who want to expand their MICE capabilities and we will be able to fast track them with mentorship from other partners in our group. We have also assigned people from different countries to support an event that may be happening in another country. That can be everything from planning to booking, because we're all on the same platform.
With our partners in APAC, we’re not just looking for a good fit, but for a keen understanding and aptitude towards technology. We need experience and talent as we need to learn from them as well as them learning from us.
What’s having the biggest impact on corporate travel management?
Artificial intelligence’s impact on corporate travel is one of the biggest trends that we’ve seen. One of the big questions is how is this all going to be regulated. Europe seems to be leading the way on this. When there is a need for human intervention and human expertise, such as for complicated international travel, policy, development, we will not be using AI.
Sustainability is another important area. It has moved beyond looking at your carbon footprint, and it’s more about trying to change behavior, making it easy for travellers to make choices that are sustainable through visibility, with tools and also with agents. Companies are increasingly understanding the impact, but also acknowledging where they might be double dipping and making sure that doesn't happen.
What trends are you seeing in the MICE industry, and within APAC in particular?
What we are seeing is really exciting; it’s this recognition by high level executive leadership that interacting with people in their business is extraordinarily important. And it's not just with customers, it's with everybody. So we're seeing more training in person and district or regional meetings being promoted, more so than prior to the pandemic.
“We are seeing more luxury events being hosted across Asia and more interest in companies going to Asia from Europe and the Americas.”
Companies are also willing to pay more for higher level speakers, such as subject-matter experts in their field. We’re also seeing more motivational speakers being booked, which was a little bit of a surprise, because often executives consider that a bit of a luxury. But what this also reveals is that companies are becoming increasingly sensitive with regards to employee retention.
We are seeing more luxury events being hosted across Asia and more interest in companies going to Asia from Europe and the Americas. It's always been a little difficult to get people to go to Asia unless it was Bali or a resort destination, but the interest in Asia is being driven by the fact that companies are doing business there. We’re seeing more events in destinations like Vietnam and Singapore, which is always on the list. But interest in Singapore has waned a bit because fewer companies have operations there - increasingly they’re heading to China.