ABTA met in the Intercity Hotel Graz

A few days ago the Austrian Business Travel Association held a meeting at the Intercity Hotel Graz. Around 30 people specializing in business trips took part.

As the first item on the program, the host team of the IntercityHotel Graz - led by General Manager Stefan Willensdorfer - took a brief interim assessment since the opening in November 2020, giving an insight into the advantages of the hotel - with 229 rooms in three categories, the largest hotel in Graz - and invited people to take a tour of the house together. Furthermore, Daniel Miehahn, Business Development Manager at HRS, charmingly delved into the wide world of hotel bookings with the assembled guests, pointed out the pleasing double-digit rate increases in the wake of the post-pandemic recovery curve and devoted a very insightful look at the “digital transformation” adjustment screws. , “Responsible Sustainability”, “Satisfaction & Safety of Travelers” and “Combination of Work & Accommodation”, from HRS’s point of view the most promising levers for companies.

Afterwards, Julia Kopac, Account Manager visum.at/CIBTvisas and Bestar Dauti, Branch Office Manager at CIBT, started a worth seeing double conference on current visa topics. Using the USA and China, the two shed a lot of light on the complexity of current regulations and application processes and went through an overall approach of visa categories, lead times, fingerprints, photos, deadlines and forms. Consulate curiosities from daily practice could not be missing.

In a final presentation, its managing director Wolfgang Grimus explained how Graz Airport proactively deals with a wide range of future issues. He reported on the exploitation of potential around the future Koralmbahn, as well as on considerations for the Graz-Vienna-Graz flight route, further optimization of services and offerings in daily passenger care, as well as existing environmental and sustainability projects at the airport that are currently being evaluated . In particular, energy supply through a generous PV system is intended to usher in a new era. With a view to other environmental issues, Wolfgang Grimus also had the most surprising number of the evening ready: with a wink, but visibly proudly, Grimus counts more than 250.000 employees on his team. The airport has its own honey production thanks to the friendly support of 10 bee colonies and thousands of bees on its own 270 hectares of grassland.

At the end, the first-class host qualities of the IntercityHotel team, finger food and drinks provided the best conditions for an informative evening with the assembled travel professionals.