Even as 2030 emission reduction goals loom large in the minds of so many companies across the globe, there’s one key area of the business that too many sustainability leaders overlook: business travel.
As business leaders, sustainability innovators, and stewards of the planet, it’s high time to pull every lever available to you to meet these ambitious and urgent carbon goals and you might be surprised at the size of the opportunity you uncover when you take a closer look at travel.
Across industries, employee business travel is a significant contributor to a company’s Scope 3 emissions. In some industries with highly mobile workforces, such as consulting, that number can be as high as 80 percent. But whether travel accounts for a large or small share of your company’s footprint, business travel should be a top priority in your sustainability strategy as it remains a highly visible category that can deliver meaningful emissions reductions while building momentum for broader sustainability initiatives.
Pragmatic, cost-effective changes to your business’s travel program can lead to the kind of measurable, company-wide impact firms need to meet their decarbonization goals. In fact, companies across geographies and markets are already doing just that. Let’s see what we can learn from their examples.
How high-efficiency aircrafts saved 60 tons of carbon on a single route in only 3 months, putting annual savings on track to exceed 240 tons
With so much focus on SAF (sustainable aviation fuel), it can be easy to forget all the other technological advances aviation has made in a short time–advances that have been fully commercialized and in-market, ready for travel managers and their partners in sustainability to take advantage of. For many travel programs, simply encouraging travelers to book more fuel-efficient aircraft can deliver immediate impact. Across our client base, we’ve found that this approach reduces emissions by an average of 17%, often without increasing travel costs.
Take, for example, the success story of one international pharmaceutical firm, whose travelers are frequent flyers between London and New York. The company wanted to reduce emissions on this heavily traveled route but needed a practical solution that didn’t require reducing travel. Advito first helped identify which suppliers were operating newer, high-efficient aircraft on this route.
To encourage adoption, Advito helped the travel team customize its online booking tool with banners and point-of-sale messaging that highlighted these lower-emission flight options whenever employees searched for flights on this route.
Within a short three months, this campaign increased the share of flights booked on high-efficiency aircraft for this route to 20%, saving 60 tons of carbon–and a savings of approximately $68,000 in air spend. By comparison, if the client had relied solely on SAF purchases to achieve the same emissions reduction, it would have required an additional investment of roughly $20,000 to $25,000. Instead, this initiative reduced emissions while generating significant cost savings.
How shifting travel from air to rail generated 500 tons in carbon savings
While a significant impact is possible simply by flying better, an even bigger impact is possible by shifting as much travel as pragmatically possible away from air and on to rail.
According to a report by the New York Times, taking the train instead of flying can produce carbon savings of as much as 80% to 95% per passenger. With the size of this opportunity, travel managers and their partners in sustainability initiatives should be taking a hard look at every route where they can shift employee travel from air to rail.
Take the example of another global pharmaceutical company. With the help of Advito, they ran an analysis of all air routes to identify which could pragmatically shift to rail without any impact to traveler convenience or experience.
The results might surprise you: a full quarter of the company’s flights (25 percent) were good candidates for moving to rail routes.
This initial revelation did not have the immediate impact they might have hoped, though. It was one thing to discover the opportunity, but another entirely to effectively communicate that opportunity to employee travelers and shift their behaviors. At first, travelers were choosing rail over air on these routes only one-third of the time–an accomplishment for certain, but not the loftier goals the travel team had hoped for.
That’s where Advito was once again able to step in and assist, designing and implementing a traveler communications strategy. Whereas previously, many business travelers hadn’t got the memo–they didn’t even realize rail was an option–now they saw intranet content, email newsletters, banners in their search results and more showing how much carbon they could save, or messaging showing how rail could offer a more cost-effective and comfortable travel experience. With the intervention of this campaign, travelers were reminded of greener options every time they opened their online booking tool.
In the end, bookings for rail travel on eligible routes more than doubled, increasing from 31 percent to 65 percent, generating savings of about 500 tons of CO₂ in a single year. On some top routes, market share even hit above 90 percent!
2030 emissions target deadlines are right around the corner. Could your organization’s travel program make the difference?
How one firm harnessed the power of an omnichannel traveler messaging campaign to transform their sustainability efforts
Every day at work, employees encounter multiple touchpoints with company communications. Whether that’s email newsletters, cafeteria signage, or browsing a company intranet page, employees are constantly interacting with company communications.
The smartest travel programs are leveraging every potential business traveler touch point to educate and improve their experience–and help meet their company’s overall sustainability goals.
In the case of one financial services firm, Advito designed a comprehensive traveler communications campaign aimed at one core goal: reducing carbon emissions. That meant influencing traveler choices about whether they travel, how they travel, where they stayed when they travel and more.
As part of this initiative, Advito and the firm’s travel team introduced targeted merchandising in the client’s online booking tool, nudging travelers toward more sustainable options at the point of sale. The firm saw a:
- 9% increase in train travel on routes where rail was a viable alternative to air,
- 16% increase in bookings at eco-certified hotels
- 17% increase in the use of high-efficiency aircraft on key air routes
all by taking advantage of pre-existing platforms where they could conveniently meet business travelers “where they’re at.”
Take the first step to Scope 3 emissions reductions
If you take anything away from the examples of innovative, smarter travel programs shared here, it should be that the size of your opportunity for carbon savings within your travel program may be bigger and more easily implemented than you could have imagined. But the only way to find out is to start with a look at your program data.
To learn more about the strategies and tactics other leading travel and sustainability programs are using to further their Scope 3 emissions reduction goals, download Advito’s free report: A smarter approach to business travel emissions.
