Business
ByMary Schlangenstein,Esha Dey, andBrian Eckhouse
Industry observers say the U.S. airline industry is being pounded by the catastrophic loss of passengers during the pandemic are confronting a once-unthinkable scenario: that this crisis will obliterate much of the corporate flying they’ve relied on for decades to prop up profits.
Adam Pilarski, senior vice president at Avitas, an aviation consultant noted, “It is likely that business travel will never return to pre-Covid levels". “It is one of those unfortunate cases where the industry will be permanently impaired and what we lost now is gone, never to come back.”
Pilarski also noted that the most lucrative part of the airline industry, driven by businesses that accepted the need to spend a few thousand dollars for a last-minute ticket across the U.S. or over an ocean. While millions of customers fly rarely, road warriors are constantly in the air to close a deal, depose a witness or impress a client. Business travel makes up 60% to 70% of industry sales, according to estimates by the trade group Airlines for America.
That figure is now under threat in the wake of an unprecedented collapse in passengers that started four months ago.
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