According to the recently released ASTA Travel Agency Business Trends survey, some travel agencies were able to weather the past year unscathed, but the majority of agencies showed large drops in revenue and transactions. The survey also shows that while most leisure agencies are expecting to recover in early 2010, corporate agencies are not expecting a recovery until the spring of 2010 or later.
Among the survey's findings were:
- When comparing the first half of 2009 to the same time period in 2008, 78.2 percent of agencies saw a decrease in revenue, while 75.2 percent saw a decrease in transactions.
- 63.6 percent of agencies saw a decrease in the number of clients when comparing the first half of 2009 to the first half of 2008. Not surprisingly, corporate agency respondents have seen greater decreases in revenue.
- 76 percent of respondents cut 'operating costs'
