BENGALURU:Lokesh Kumar, the director of outdoor advertising firm Ikon, travels on work 15 days a month. When realisation dawned that he was practically left with no time to go on personal vacations, the 43-year-old tweaked his business travel itineraries to become a bleisure traveller.Now, Kumar's trip to an annual general conference in Paris extends to a holiday with his family. A talk at an outdoor advertising festival in Ahmedabad is followed by a visit to the Rann of Kutch . Malaysia, Singapore, Indonesia, Sri Lanka and a few European countries have been covered likewise. Come June, an R&D meeting in Budapest will turn into a family vacation.Bleisure - mixing business with leisure - is apparently the answer to achieving work-life balance among employees in the corporate sector. More and more workers are adding a leisure component to their official trips. An Indian management consulting firm headquartered in Bengaluru sponsors bleisure trips for employees and their families.According to Ayush K (22), a business analyst, the company has increased the frequency of these trips from once every quarter to once every two months."Most of us are young and single.Bleisure trips break work monotony and helps us bond with colleagues and friends," he says.Travel analysts noted that the graph for this unconventional travel segment is growing rapidly here. Observing a 200% increase in the number of bleisure enquiries, Ashok Karanth, founder of Sportytrip Experiences, says, "Tech com panies from Bengaluru schedule their client meetings in London around Wimbledon Sightseeing enquiries come for business trips to Goa, Pondicherry and Kolkata. Come May, a few top-level executives attending their sales conference in Paris will take time off to attend a football match between Arsenal and Manchester United in London with their families."Cab rental companies are witnessing a boom in such requests too.Road tourism is emerging popular with domestic business trips where the free weekend is dedicated to exploring nearby destinations like Ooty , Mysuru and Coorg or Kasauli, Simla and Agra near Delhi.Eco Rent A Car, which has clients in MNCs, embassies and five starhotels, saw 10-15% increase in bleisure bookings from Bengaluru this year. According to their concierge desk, a 25% year-on-year growth has been witnessed in the bleisure travel segment.Director Aditya Loomba, says, "Extending business trips for fun is a cost-effective way to travel. IT and marketing professionals, between 30 and 50 years, are takers. We are also getting requests for luxury cars like BMWs, Audis and Mercedes by top-level executives to make their trips memorable."