Small and midsize enterprises look to be holding travel steady—and even growing their spend—amid economic and geopolitical uncertainty. The vast majority is paying little heed to the distractions and are forging ahead with their original budgets and plans, as of mid-May when BTN Intelligence surveyed SME travel program managers about their outlook and current practices. Still, cost is top of mind for SMEs, and increasing budgets may not be wholly an indicator of a bullish outlook. 

The first-quarter U.S. Chamber of Commerce Small Business Index survey (conducted Jan. 28 to Feb 14) showed inflation continues to be the small business owner’s top concern by far, with 58 percent of small business citing it as their top concern. Revenue generation was also a growing concern, rising 10 percentage points across survey respondents to 35 percent in the first quarter of 2025 compared to the previous quarter. 

Industry observers told BTN that SMEs tend to execute on planned travel to support their businesses, to get in front of clients and generate revenue. They have fewer edges to trim even when economic uncertainties might put pressure on them to cut costs. As such, the rising cost of travel may simply be the rising cost of business and may not indicate additional trips or voluntary investment. 

Read the latest report from BTN Intelligence on how Small & Midsize Travel Programs are meeting cost and other challenges in 2025 and how they are interfacing with suppliers, travel management partners and innovation opportunities...

BTN conducted two sets of surveys to inform this report. From Jan. 15-Feb. 15, BTN fielded a 40-question survey to business travel buyers to gather projections about travel volumes going into 2025 and queried them about their recent experiences negotiating their programs; working with suppliers; service levels received; technology resources, budgets and constraints; the prospects of travel innovation in the coming year; and how they would redefine the business travel value chain if they could. The survey received 314 total buyer responses—among those responses, 155 were small and midsize organizations, which have been isolated and tabulated for the charts in this survey.

BTN also conducted from May 4-14 an additional survey to SME buyers only to get updated information on their travel program outlook, biggest challenges and disposition toward loyalty programs in 2025. That survey pulled in 155 respondents. 

This report is supported by nearly a dozen, buyer, consultant, technology provider and travel agency interviews to provide richer context around the survey data. Some buyers were granted anonymity in order to elicit their most candid responses on supplier relationships and emerging program strategies. Background information or quotations based on confidential sources have been corroborated by on-record sources. BTN has also synthesized concepts and commentary from our BTN SME Community (400-plus buyer members) to inform the background and analysis provided in this report. In line with our Community guidelines, none of the commentary was directly quoted from those meetings.