Spend on Car Rentals More than Doubles Annually in Q2 2023, Emburse SpendSmart Reports

LOS ANGELES AND PORTLAND, MAINE — August 1, 2023 — Emburse, a leader in travel and expense (T&E) management, announced today the results of its Q2 2023 SpendSmart Travel Trends report. This quarterly report tracks how much organizations spend on business travel, as well as trends for booking volume and trip length, and compares it to the previous year and the previous quarter.

In Q2 2023, business travel measures changed as follows:

• Volume of domestic flights booked: 30% up from Q2 2022 and 12% up from Q1 2023
• Amount spent on domestic flights: 22% up from Q2 2022 and 14% up from Q1 2023
• Volume of international flights booked: 86% up from Q2 2022 and 18% up from Q1 2023
• Amount spent on international flights: 92% up from Q2 2022 and 46% up from Q1 2023
• Volume of car rentals booked: 36% up from Q2 2022 and 25% up from Q1 2023
• Amount spent on car rentals: 224% up from Q2 2022 and 172% up from Q1 2023
• Volume of hotel reservations booked: 50% up from Q2 2022 and 15% up from Q1 2023
• Amount spent on hotel reservations: 50% up from Q2 2022 and 27% up from Q1 2023

Car rental companies reduced their fleets during the pandemic lockdown and have not yet fully restocked. When the pandemic emergency was declared over in May 2023, a boom in demand for car rentals drove prices up exponentially, which is reflected by the data released today. This leaves corporate travel managers in a position to make difficult decisions about how to guide their employees for business trip transportation.

“The state of the car rental market is a great example of why we are making moves like our recent acquisition of TRIPBAM, which ensures that companies are getting the best rates on rental cars, hotels and airfare,” said Eric Friedrichsen, CEO of Emburse. “Business travel continues to rebound, but the economy we are in is different from that of 2019 or even last year. While our customers are lifting travel bans, they are still looking to maximize the value they get for each trip. And we're helping them by reducing the cost side of the ROI calculation.”

Emburse plans to continue monitoring these figures and updating them quarterly. The next SpendSmart Travel Trends report will examine Q3 2023 and will be available in October.

About Emburse

Emburse is the global leader in spend optimization. Our expense, travel management, purchasing and accounts payable, and payments solutions are trusted by more than 12 million business professionals, including CFOs, finance teams, and travelers. More than 18,000 organizations in 120 countries, including FORTUNE 100 corporations, high-growth startups, public sector agencies, and nonprofits, count on our intelligent automation, sophisticated analytics, and unmatched spend control to streamline processes, increase spend visibility, enhance compliance, and deliver positive financial outcomes.

Our mission is to humanize work by eliminating manual, time-consuming tasks, so our customers and their teams can focus on what matters most in their personal and professional lives.

For more information on Emburse, visit emburse.com, or follow our social channels at @Emburse.

Methodology

The data in the Emburse Business Travel Index represents 150,000 individual transactions made by travel management companies using Emburse’s expense management platform for business travel expenses. It reflects the months of April, May, and June collectively (Q2) for the years 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, and 2023.