Top 2025 Incentive Travel Trends

February 26, 2025

What’s hot in incentive travel trends for 2025, from new destinations to cruises to AI.

The latest IRF Trends Report from the Incentive Research Foundation takes a deep dive into how incentive programs and rewards are shifting to maximize their impact in 2025. In a recent webinar, incentive experts — Morgan Crain, Leader of Global Rewards & Recognition, Rubrik/Chair, 2025 IRF Board of Trustees; Rudy Garza, Vice President, Operations, Brightspot Incentives & Events/Chair, 2025 IRF Research Committee; and Andy Schwarz, Vice President, Content & Communications, IRF — explored some of the incentive travel trends outlined in the report.

Schwarz kicked it off with an overview of where the industry’s pain points are now. “We’re starting the year with concern over budgets, cost reductions, how to be more efficient while we are motivating employees, motivating channel partners and creating memorable experiences.”

Variety Is the Spice of Incentives

What has become increasingly apparent, said Crain, is that the expansion of rewards offerings is now critical. “One-size-fits-all gifting doesn’t work — I don’t know that it ever did. Having a variety of rewards, from reward points, merchandise, gift cards and experiential rewards, is critical to keeping our teams motivated, engaged and helping them feel connected to the company and, more importantly, to one another. This also helps support retention. … Offering a gift of choice helps employees feel more valued.” Garza added that it’s vital to consider both exclusivity — rewards that are exclusive for a top-performing group — and reach, so you can reward a broader group of participants.

“If a company offers a trip, would they consider a points program as well to motivate the middle, or vice versa? … One trend that we see with the expansion of awards is buyers introducing tiers for their incentive trips, making the trips more inclusive, rather than exclusive. And so you’ve got your top-performer group, but then maybe you’ve got the next-level group that that are also being rewarded with the trip,” he said.

Event Gifting

The Incentive Travel Index found that, in addition to reducing and streamlining activities, event gifting is one of the areas planners turn to when seeking cost savings. “I would say one easy way to achieve cost savings when it comes to event gifting is to think quality versus quantity,” said Garza. “Have, that big arrival-day on-site gifting experience that we all love, maybe followed by a room drop at the midpoint of the program, and then a farewell final night room drop to cap it all off. Anything more than that can just get overwhelming and or over-burdensome for attendees.”

Mapping Out New Locales

The latest Incentive Travel Index also found that 70% of buyers are looking for new destinations. While groups tended to stay domestic immediately post-pandemic, then ventured out to broader, well-known destinations such as Hawaii, Mexico and the Caribbean, now they’re wanting to go to more exotic locales, such as Morocco, Dubai and South America, said Garza. Even long-haul bucket-list destinations such as South Africa, Asia and Australia are now back for top-tier travel incentives.

“This is even more important for programs that have repeat winners, keeping things fresh and exciting,” said Schwarz. “It’s hard to recreate the wheel when you’re going to the same destination over and over again, especially if you have those repeat folks.” But that’s not always possible, leading to a “push and pull of how to meet the needs of attendees who want completely new destinations and experiences when you’re staying close to home and possibly returning to destinations you may have been to before.”

Garza said, “It may not always be a new destination, but a new experience could help get people excited. For example, we say to clients that go to Maui often, have you considered traveling to Kauai or the Big Island to provide a completely different cultural experience to your group? What about boutique hotel brands like Auberge, Belmont or Rosewood, which are continuously opening new five-star properties that could wow attendees or groups that always go to the beach.”

Cruise Appeal

The study found that incentive cruising has increased from prior years. “It’s a fantastic thing, considering how hard cruising industry was hit from the pandemic,” said Schwarz. Among the reason for the incentive cruise uptick are its reputation for being considered safe and secure, and its ability to offer multiple ports of call while staying under one roof and only having to unpack once. It also offers all the comforts of a luxury hotel. “And here’s my favorite stat of all the studies that we did in 2024: 75% of respondents said that the cruise experience itself was desirable destination,” he added.

Crain said that incentive cruises also are one way to counter the potential budget issues with land travel. Plus, she added, “As a program owner, I love having all my participants under one roof. It makes things a little bit easier logistically.” Among the potential downsides, panelists said, were possible space limitations, and they often require a longer advance booking for charters.

Popular cruise destinations are the Caribbean and the Mediterranean, which have gotten a big increase in RFPs lately, followed by river and Alaskan cruises, which have seen a moderate increase, said Schwarz.

Incentive Planning and AI

Almost two-thirds of respondents believe that AI is already being used, or soon will be, for incentive travel, according to the Incentive Travel Index. But how are they using it?

Garza said that, like most companies in the incentive industry space, Brightspot is “exploring the various ways that we can fully utilize AI tools to be as effective and as efficient as possible. Our Chief Technology Officer developed an AI Governance Policy last year that clearly outlines both acceptable use and prohibited use. Especially since we’re in the third-party world, we’re very mindful of protecting our clients’ proprietary program designs and personal data.” His company is using various subscription-based tools to aid with brainstorming, theming, copywriting and graphic design, “and our events tech leader has been investigating an AI tool specific for event planners that I’m hoping that we go ahead and make the decisions to start utilizing it in earnest this year.

“If I were to sum it all up, I would say last year we got our feet wet. This year we are looking to jump into the pool and fully embrace AI.”

Rubrik addressed the privacy concerns by having its engineers built a custom version of ChatGPT that is safe, secure and accessible only behind the company’s firewall on a VPN. “We needed a safe space for our engineers to model product innovations and for us to all to kind of start to play with AI and learn how it can help automate our processes and make things more efficient,” Crain said.