According to a new report released this week, South Dakota is one of only a handful of states whose business travel in 2022 is projected to be higher than it was in 2019– but not by much.
The American Hotel & Lodging Association and Kalibri Labs business travel data for South Dakota shows:
• $232,876,639 spent on business travel in 2019
• Projected 2022 expenditure on business travel: $233,232,902
• Difference between 2019 and 2022 projected: $356,262
• Percent increase: 0.2%
Other states with a projected increase in 2022 over 2019 are:
• Maine: 3.2%
• Mississippi: 6.6%
• Montana: 4.6%
• Nevada: 16.7%
Overall, US hotel business travel revenue in 2022 is projected to be 23% below pre-pandemic levels, ending the year down more than $20 billion compared to 2019. This comes after hotels lost an estimated $108 billion in business travel revenue during 2020 and 2021 combined.
While leisure travel is expected to return to pre-pandemic levels this year, business travel— which includes corporate, group, government and other commercial categories— is the hotel industry’s largest source of revenue and will take significantly longer to recover.