9th March, 2005: The US travel industry is offering new programs for small businesses according to the American Small Business Travelers Alliance (ASBTA). The report said that the main focus here is to boost marketing to this sector.

ASBTA is a non-profit organization in the US that highlights travel requirements of small business magnates. According to the vice president of ASBTA, Chet Gray, the travel industry is planning to come up with programs that cater to employees in small businesses who need to travel.

New curricula such as the American's Business ExtrAA program from American Airlines will help small business customers to earn rewards while they travel. There is another program that allows a complimentary membership to Emerald Club for those traveling across the country.

There are hotel programs for small business customers staying at various hotels across the US. For instance, Starwood Preferred Business will allow free airline travel, employee reward etc. The small business organizations can also save their lodging expenditure if they book the rooms within the required timeframe.

Apart from various discounts and schemes launched by the travel industry for the small business sector, there are also services such as the National Car Rental that will help the sector to organize meetings and conventions that need traveling.

The fundamental idea of all these programs and services is to boost marketing to small business sector by providing savings and discounts to the people who travel a lot.