In recent years, “bleisure,” a combination of leisure with business travel, “workations,” a combination of business with leisure travel, and the digital nomad lifestyle of working while traveling and living domestically and overseas without any particular home base have been growing overseas, and these movements are gradually beginning to take off in Japan as well.
What these movements means for destination cities and communities is that the usual solo visitors are now families of two or three people, and one-night stays are extended to two or three nights to include leisure activities, thereby expanding business opportunities. However, at the same time, it is not enough for communities and facilities to cater to the usual businesspersons alone, as it is predicted that new needs will arise to fulfill.
Amid these circumstances, in this special feature, we will present the ways in which business travel is diversifying, what challenges and possibilities are present, and investigate what future response measures should be considered.