As an entrepreneur, business trips can be a great way to market your business but they can also be very expensive. Yes, you get to write them off, but until tax time you still bear the full burden of the payment. It’s always helpful to have ways to reduce costs, especially on longer business trips.
Here are three great tips for how to save money when paying for your own long business trip:
Extended Stay Hotels
Extended stay hotels can be a life-saver on a long trip. First, their prices per night are often lower than regular hotels because they have you book in for a longer length of time. This can save money right up front.
In addition, they are equipped with small kitchens, allowing you to save money on the biggest expense of all – food. When you can go to a nearby grocery store, buy simple ingredients, and prepare meals in your room, you’ll save a fortune on your trip.
Finally, like most hotels, extended stay hotels often have pools, weight rooms, internet, and television free of charge. This can help you save a lot on entertainment options. There are great options around the country like Homestead Hotels for extended stays.
Buy a Used Car and Drive
Buying a car isn’t usually on anyone’s list of money-saving tips, but hear me out!
If a destination is 7 hours or less away by car, it’s often easier – and cheaper – to drive than to fly. Not only do you save the money on airfare, but you can pack the way YOU need to without paying for checked baggage.
- You save the time you would have spent in airport security and waiting to change planes.
- There’s no risk of lost luggage.
- You don’t have to pay expensive daily rental car rates over the length of your stay.
- And, you’re not captive to the area around your hotel – you can go find cheaper food and more fun entertainment if you have your own car.
Using your personal vehicle for business travel puts on a lot of extra miles and with repairs it becomes difficult to separate the business expense from the personal expense for tax purposes. A quality used car that you use for business trips can save you
money over and over, making it a great investment. One great outlet for used cars is Hertz Car Sales, a division of Hertz that sells one year old retired rental cars.
Consolidate All Spending to One Credit Card
When you are traveling, it’s very useful to put all of your purchases and expenses on a single card. Not only is it much easier to track how much the trip cost your business, but you can more quickly accumulate credit card rewards like frequent flier miles, reward points, discounts, and other benefits.
You should have one credit card that’s issued in your business name for business expenses and make sure you choose one with great rewards that really pay off! In the future when you cash in those rewards, you’ll be saving a lot of money.
There are many ways to save money on extended business trips. The three above seemed to me to make the biggest impact. Do you agree? How do you go about saving money on long trips?
About Lindsay
Lindsay Parker is a content analyst for Hertz Car Sales. Hertz innovated used car sales by creating Hertz Rent2Buy®, the first car buying experience that lets you live with your purchase before you actually make it. View their available used cars here and use the promo code R2B-CSU for $100 off your purchase.
If so, please join over 10,000 people who receive exclusive weekly online business and blogging tips, and get a FREE COPY of my eBook, 10 Steps to Free Website Traffic! Just enter your name and email below:
If you're building a business website these days, you're in luck.
WordPress has revolutionized the ease and power of what a website can do and be. Now you can quickly create a website that is optimized for top search results, and update it yourself whenever you want.
As you'll see in a moment, the SmallBiz Theme is much more than a mere WordPress theme. It's a complete solution for your business web presence including a Website, Blog, Facebook Page and Mobile Website.
Let's take a look at each of these, and how they help you generate new business from the web…
Click to continue...See my disclosure about advertising and affiliate links
{ 1 comment… read it below or add one }
I am yet not that big business man or even a corporate employee that I would go on business trips. But yes you have shared some valuable and usable tips which can actually same bugs. Thanks for the information Lindsay. I also loved the piggy bank in the picture, lol.