New Amex Team Offers Discounts On Group Travel

<FONT SIZE="+3"><B>New Amex Team Offers Discounts On Group Travel</B>

By Lauren Bielski

American Express has put together a purchasing team to attract deeper discounts from vendors for Group Travel Management Service accounts.

Amex is forming the new team, headed by director of purchasing and planning Lars Holmquist, as it attempts to evolve from a provider of meeting- planning logistical support into a consultant offering tips for best buys.

The agency also has been developing a portfolio-which will be accessible on-line to all of its planners-of off-season and shoulder season rates for about 600 resort and meeting hotels, and is encouraging its clients to coordinate air and hotel purchases to achieve the best overall event cost.

Despite its mega-agency status-and its more targeted effort to launch GTMS in 1993 and fold in Thomas Cook's base of group business-GTMS has yet to capture group business on a significant portion of its $8 billion transient accounts.

What was missing, GTMS management now asserts, was a purchasing division that was fully dedicated to group buys-a problem Amex addressed about six months ago, when the meeting purchasing services department was formed.

In addition to Holmquist, the team includes Robert Pietro, senior manager of air operations, and Kim Kearns, senior manager of hotel operations. It includes four specialists in group air purchasing and 11 hotel buyers. They report to Victor Macchio, vice president and general manager of GTMS.

Their first major project has been the development of a continuously updated calendar of off-season discount rates from Amex's listing of top 20 resorts and top 25 business hotels with meeting facilities,which should be completed by January. This will list all of the low-cost availabilities for participating properties in the United States during a particular period.

The calendar will reflect off-season discounts as well as last- minute cancellations. "We have talked with all the major chains, including Hilton, Sheraton and Hyatt, about supplying us with off-season property information," Holmquist said.

Every property in the portfolio additionally reflects an Amex negotiated rate, and the agency will push for additional discounts based on the value of the client's business. This portfolio will supplement the agency's Meeting Destination Query System, a software tool in use since 1992 that analyzes air and hotel costs in order to determine the most cost-effective destination. "You'd be surprised at how many decisions to go to a particular destination are completely arbitrary," said Holmquist.