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Priceline President comments on anti-business travel talk

Speaking to reporters at the Reuters Travel and Leisure Summit in New York, Priceline's President and Chief Executive Officer Jeffery H. Boyd linked a decline in business travel to recent anti-travel rhetoric from the country's politicians.

"There's been a more rapid downturn in business travel than leisure travel," Boyd told the group.  He said that the decline has been driven, in part, by anti-travel comments made by government officials who are highly critical of travel spending by companies receiving federal bailout funds.  Fearful of a backlash, companies are eliminating corporate events, incentive trips and business travel.  Boyd said the anti-travel comments are putting unfair pressure on the travel industry and recommended that a stop be put to the comments.

Boyd used Las Vegas as an example.  "Think of all the people who work in the tourism industry in Las Vegas.  Most of them don't make a lot of money to begin with and they depend on income from visitors.  Imagine what these comments do to them."

Also this week, the U.S. Travel Association launched a "Meetings Mean Business" campaign to defend business meetings and events from politicized attack.  According to a new survey by Meetings and Conventions magazine, more than 20 percent of companies that have not received bailout money have canceled events due to media and political attention.  52% said news coverage and comments have been influential in their decisions to hold or cancel events.

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