Product News & Updates

How one road warrior saved her company $5k with Airbnb for Work

Road warrior Kari Doyle had a dilemma. She preferred staying with Airbnb on her frequent business trips, but it wasn’t included in her company’s travel program.

“I am quite passionate about Airbnb and I love it,” said Kari, who travels a minimum of three days every week as Bid Manager for Graham Capital. “It’s one of the best services for people who are on the road all the time.”

Kari’s determination to use Airbnb when traveling for work led to her creating a spreadsheet documenting her cost savings for an upcoming 4-month project in Vancouver.

“I did the numbers on what the cost would be on average with the corporate rate we got at hotels and compared it to real-time numbers provided by Airbnb, and I included savings on food,” she said. “Your food budget goes down as well because you shop at grocery stores and cook as opposed to eating in restaurants.”

The numbers told a compelling story: staying in an Airbnb for her project would save the company about $5,000.

Problem solved

Those savings–and Kari’s explanation of the positive impact staying in an Airbnb would have on her health, comfort and productivity–won her manager’s approval to use Airbnb for the Vancouver project. After she returned, Kari’s documentation was instrumental in helping her travel department convince leadership to incorporate Airbnb into the company’s travel program.

In fact, after officially including Airbnb in Graham’s travel policy, the travel department sent out a company-wide email detailing savings from using Airbnb, and encouraging travelers to make Airbnb their first consideration for future business trips.

Thanks in large part to Kari’s efforts, all of Graham’s business travelers now have another accommodation choice for business travel. “Airbnb has changed my life,” Kari said. “I am a lot happier traveling now than I ever was before.”