NEW YORK— UBS Warburg reports that corporate spending by large companies this year is expected to be “unchanged relative to 2001, with contract-room rates down up to 5% on average.” Spending for 2002, however, will be 10% to 20% below 2000’s levels, which was a peak year for the industry, according to the firm. The report, which notes that two-thirds of the revenue at most hotels comes from business travel, indicates that most corporations have gotten used to having their employees travel less frequently, and that it’s unlikely companies will ever go back to 2000 spending levels. According to its own research, UBS Warburg notes that corporate group meetings and conferences are being booked again, but that “smaller, internal meetings are not coming back as of yet.” The firm said it believes this trend is occurring because larger conferences are typically customer oriented, and necessary to maintain or build market share. “Having said that, we were told by our hotel contacts during January that many of the larger hotels were more aggressively pursuing booking small- to medium-size corporate and association group meetings due to weak booking and attendance trends related to large conferences and citywide conventions,” said the report.
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