How Group Travel Is Changing Event Dynamics
The cliche of the business traveler is the image of the solo traveler who’s in town to attend the event and go home. This longtime trend is changing, and the Hilton 2025 Trends Report marks the advent of a new kind of business travel: Pod Squad Travel.
This new trend involves event attendees who prefer to travel with colleagues and friends to enhance their event experience. Needless to say, Pod Squad Travel changes the way planners approach events.
“According to Hilton’s 2025 Trends Report, nearly 30% of global travelers (29%) often travel with ‘Frolleagues’ ― friends who are also colleagues ― on leisure trips,” explains the Hilton 2025 Trends Report. “For the 25% of global respondents who plan to travel more in 2025 for ‘bleisure,’ combining business and leisure trips, extending their days on the road with Frolleagues can be both convenient and fun.”
Group business travel presents some new opportunities and challenges for planners like you to tackle. How does event design foster deeper connections when groups of travelers are already connected? How do you encourage organic networking between groups?
That’s what we’re going to explore in this article. We’re going to dive into how you can design spaces and curate experiences that maximize engagement while blending preestablished connections with new opportunities for networking, and we’ll see how CORT Event is uniquely positioned to help you design and maximize these environments.
The Rise of Pod Squad Travel & What It Means for Events
Attendees are more comfortable traveling in small groups of colleagues and friends, according to Hilton’s 2025 Event Trends Report. It’s easy to see why. Having colleagues and friends traveling together eliminates the awkwardness of solo travel and enhances the sense of belonging.
The trouble that goes along with Pod Squad Travel is that it could create networking silos. After all, it’s human nature to stick with the familiar. Naturally, this presents challenges for you as an event planner.
Groups may stick together instead of branching out; therefore, more traditional networking formats like cocktail hours tend to not fully engage clusters of attendees who are more comfortable with each other.
What’s the remedy? You can reimagine networking with interactive, small-group experiences that encourage pods to interact with others in natural, meaningful ways. This is what we’ll look at in the following sections.
Designing Spaces That Encourage Cross-Group Interaction
There’s a direct correlation between an event’s physical layout and how attendees behave, so designing the right flow can help encourage movement and engagement. Let’s take a look at some examples.
For a lounge zone, you can set up modular lounge areas that allow smaller groups to settle in but remain open to organic connections. To achieve this, create clusters of soft seating that foster spontaneous conversations between different pods.
Design engagement hubs that serve as collaborative lounges where pods can work together with other teams on interactive challenges. Experiential zones like brainstorming stations and conversation pods open the door to connections with new people.
How CORT Supports:
You can achieve maximum versatility when you use Endless Seating within multifunctional spaces that you can transition from small group discussions to open networking areas. Foster a fluid event flow by incorporating ottomans, café tables and seating, and high-top tables so that attendees feel comfortable shifting between conversations.
Set up curated seating zones with comfortable, functional furniture like the Valencia Loveseat and Chair and Nile rug to ensure that engagement hubs feel less like traditional networking spaces and more like conversational hotspot areas. Put it all together with the expertise of the CORT team and resources like the My Space Planner that allow you to make the most of your space strategically.
Interactive Networking Experiences for the Pod Squad Mindset
The familiar modes of networking are great for solo travelers, but they’re not as effective for close-knit groups, so it’s incumbent upon you to introduce interactive experiences that make engagement with others feel natural and fun. Let’s check out some ideas.
Facilitated small-group icebreakers are great ways to engage groups with each other. Team-based challenges or mini breakout sessions that mix pods together for shared problem-solving. You can also set up sessions of speed networking in small teams rather than one-on-one to lower social pressure.
What makes networking more fun? When you turn it into a game or scavenger hunt. Devise missions that require pods to work with each other to incentivize attendees to interact with new groups. Make it more fun with digital networking badges that reward meaningful connections.
Center your networking on something other than forced small talk. Collaborative experiences can naturally bring different groups together in an enjoyable way.
How CORT Supports:
Multifunctional furniture layouts give you flexibility to adapt spaces for different activities, from structured challenges to casual networking stations.
Intentional Seating Arrangements: Mixing Familiarity With New Connections
One of the biggest keys to balancing the comfort of traveling with a Pod with encouraging new interactions is your seating strategy. Your furniture choices and space design will make all the difference in how effective your seating is.
To create flex-seating zones, use modular furniture and open lounge layouts. These space designs help promote spontaneous movement and organic networking. CORT’s Endless Seating collection offers you flexible arrangements that encourage people to interact naturally without sacrificing comfort.
Instead of random seating, introduce networking roundtables where attendees rotate through pre-assigned groups at intervals. Bring in a new discussion topic each round to ensure that pods experience the event together while still meeting new people.
How CORT Supports:
Choose sleek, comfortable seating options like accent chairs, bench seating, and communal tables that create a relaxed but intentional setting for structured networking. Maintain customizable seating plans that give you the flexibility to curate conversations while keeping groups socially engaged and mobile.
Differentiate networking areas and guide attendees toward spaces that match their preferences with distinct lounge styles like modern, casual, or minimalist. Select portable, stylish furniture that allows you to create pop-up conversation hubs where groups naturally merge with others.
Designing for Connection in the Pod Squad Era
The dynamics of events in 2025 are undergoing a transformation, which means that you have to rethink space design and networking strategies to balance the comfort of group travel with new engagement opportunities.
Today’s networking isn’t about forcing interactions but rather creating environments where they happen naturally. Responding to the Pod Squad Travel trend isn’t an insurmountable challenge when you have the right partner on your side. That’s where CORT Events comes in with flexible, immersive event design solutions that help you ensure that your spaces encourage organic networking, movement, and engagement.
CORT is about more than furniture rental; our white-glove service takes care of the logistics for you from the planning stages to teardown when the event is over. Our team walks with you every step of the way to help you customize and maximize layouts, navigate changes and modifications on the fly, and handle delivery, installation, and removal.
If your event plan includes expertly designed spaces, premium furnishings, and white-glove service from start to finish, reach out to CORT Events today. It’s time to start planning your next event with a trusted partner who brings your vision to life.
