T&H buyers, stop paying for efficiency and start demanding growth

T&H enterprise clients and ecosystem partners both agree to this: while service providers are performing well in delivering efficiency and cost impact, they’re falling short when it comes to enabling growth and innovation. Survey data from “HFS Horizons: Travel and hospitality services, 2025” showed that both customers and partners rated the “development of new business models or entry into new markets” lowest across all outcomes, a warning sign for any provider banking on long-term relevance.

Optimization wins the day, but growth is getting left behind

The most celebrated outcomes now are those that hit the bottom line, including cost reductions, efficiency gains, and improvements in the customer and employee experience. These are table stakes, but they don’t move the needle for long-term competitiveness. What’s concerning is that growth-related outcomes, such as revenue impact and market expansion, are consistently at the bottom of the priority list.

Despite all the investments in digital, GenAI, and transformation roadmaps, the business outcomes that matter most to enterprise growth are being left behind. Service providers are failing to turn capability into impact, and enterprise leaders are no longer willing to accept innovation theater.

Travel firms must rethink what they demand and what they reward

For T&H leaders, it’s time to realign the expectations and contracts. Leaders should stop incentivizing their service providers for reducing costs or improving NPS scores. Shift the service provider scorecards away from efficiency metrics and toward business agility and innovation KPIs. Tie the service agreements to new route monetization, dynamic pricing enablement, and real-time data value realization.

Enterprise leaders should look for service providers that promise to assist with entering new markets, launching subscription or loyalty models, building ancillary revenue streams, rethinking core business models, and monetizing insights in real time, not just legacy tech support.

The bottom line: If the service provider isn’t helping you unlock new revenue and market agility, it’s time to demand more or re-evaluate the relationship.

T&H leaders can’t afford to let their providers coast on cost and efficiency metrics. Demand evidence of growth-driven outcomes: new services launched, new customer segments reached, and new markets entered. If the service provider can’t prove their impact on the top line, they’re not a partner but just a vendor.