Corporate travel is changing. And Accor wants to anticipate those changes before they happen.
The France-based hotel company launched its Global Leadership Council to do just that, with plans to discuss shifting traveler expectations, the growing importance of personalization, B2B-focused loyalty, the role of distribution and more.
The council’s first-ever meeting in June brought together executive travel managers and buyers from 17 international corporations spanning financial services, manufacturing, engineering, transportation, energy, professional services and technology — and who have a combined employee base of more than 2.7 million travelers.
Hotel Dive sat down with Accor’s Chief Sales Officer, Sophie Hulgard, whose team created the group, to discuss concerns travel buyers brought up in the meeting, why Accor decided to launch the council and why money still matters when it comes to corporate travel.
This interview has been edited for clarity and brevity.
HOTEL DIVE: Why did Accor launch the Global Leadership Council?
SOPHIE HULGARD: We're really good at looking backwards. We all have data to analyze, and we understand what our travelers have done in the past, but looking forward and understanding the trends — we need to have a different approach, because the data alone is not going to give us that.
We have never had a council at the global level with the most strategic clients of Accor. So this is new. This was created by my team a few months ago. Of course, we knew all these people — many of them, we've had a relationship with for years — but it's the first time we actually put them in a room together.
[They come from] very different industries, from Europe and from North America, with very different approaches to things. So that was actually quite fascinating to listen to. They buy several million [euros] in business with Accor every year, so they're at a pretty high level, and in their company, they would be an important buyer, so they have challenging targets to achieve. And the fact that they were open about these targets and said travel, well-being, security, loyalty, savings — “this is what's important,” “this is how I'm measured” — that was really, really helpful.
Members from the council come from companies in vastly different industries. In your first meeting, were there any business travel concerns they were united on?
Money! [Laughs.] Money in the sense of savings and cost avoiding — though it used to be number one on their item list, and it’s not number one anymore. It's probably number three, number four, but it's still there. But there are new items, and the second would be sustainability. It started a few years ago, and now it's an absolute must. They've been very demanding about what they're expecting a hotel chain to be able to deliver, in terms of reporting and operationally within the hotel.
And then there are softer elements, like the well-being of the traveler. Well-being can be many different things. It can be the convenience of a hotel location or the setup of a hotel room. It can be the facilities on-site in the hotel. It can be security aspects. And [the buyers] really want to dig into this, because it's important for the travelers, but also for the travelers’ trust in their [corporate travel] program. If they do a good program that has the travelers’ trust, then there's a better chance that the travelers will follow the guidelines more closely.
What kind of sustainability markers are companies wanting from hotels?
I think there are two aspects. The first one is a compulsory check on their non-financial reporting. Both in Europe and in the U.S., with the new SEC regulations, companies will have to report on their Scope 1 [emissions], but also on their Scope 2 and 3. And the hotel industry is their Scope 3, so they need to report on it. So, we need to be able to deliver some data as accurately as possible about carbon footprint, and details like water consumption, food waste, in our hotels and simple things like how many electric plugs [we] have in [our] car parks.
And then the travelers are also saying, “Hey, wait a minute, is this hotel green enough for me? I want to lower my carbon footprint. How can you help me?” This is more about making visible everything that we're doing. So we discussed distribution a lot, because, for example, we made an agreement with Green Key, and we have a very strict target of all our hotels being externally audited and certified before the end of 2026. And many hotels are rushing to do these audits and change the way they work, and it's not visible to the traveler. It’s only on our website. But if you go to a [distribution] channel or a travel management company, or if you ask an agency, they wouldn't know. So we have a huge task of making visible all these elements that are so important for the travelers. I think that will be the next step for us, and we're actively working with technology partners to make it happen.
How does Accor think about B2B loyalty?
What the buyers are saying is that we need a company program so that we can get points and use these points for anyone in the company who needs a meeting space somewhere in a hotel. We’re absolutely developing this. And we're working together on creating this. The good thing with being last — you know, because we're a bit behind some of our competitors — is that we can now tailor it exactly to our customers’ expectations for the future. They're more and more demanding, and they know what they want. So I think it's going to be a good opportunity for us. I expect something to be developed within the next 12 months.
