Travel Agent Professional February 2016 Issue 41
Remaking Yourself By Cindy Bertram
John & Mary Stachnik
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ebruary
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Auto Europe Renews Maine Seafood Rewards Program for 16th Year
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The Cruise Line & Travel Agency Profit Partnership By Mitchell J. Schlesinger President, MJS Consultants
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AMG Adds Brian King to its Distinguished Speaker List at Global Travel Market 2016
Ad Index
Cover Photo: Mayflower Tours
Avoya Travel .................................13
HostTravelAgency.com .................11
Auto Europe .................................IFC
TRAVELSAVERS.............................17
Britain Greatdays.............................3
Royal Caribbean Line .......BC
Travel Agent Professional
2016
By Cindy Bertram Cindy's Inside Cruise & Travel Track, LLC
TAP
12
Remaking Yourself — Success to Continually Grow Your Business
Travel Agent Professional Feburary 2016 Issue 41
Travel Agent Professional P.O. Box 120198 Staten Island, NY 10312 E-mail: info@travelagentprofessional.com Phone: 718.360.3153
Joel M. Abels
Legend In the Travel Industry April 1927 to January 2007
Ann M. Hoek Publisher/Creative Design ann@travelagentprofessional.com Bonnie Walling Editor Bonnie@travelagentprofessional.com Alan Cohen Vice President Marketing Alan@travelagentprofessional.com
Meet Our Editorial Board Paull Tickner, Creator of Special Interest Britain ptickner@customgb.co.uk www.customgb.co.uk Cindy Bertram, Cindy’s Inside Cruise & Travel Track, LLC cindybert@att.net Mitchell J. Schlesinger President, MJS Consultants mjschlesinger@bellsouth.net Les-Lee Roland Owner of The Package Deal Rusty Pickett, ECC Shellback Cruises www.shellbackcruises.com Sherry Laskin, ACC Travel Writer/NACTA Webinar Moderator www.cruisemaven.com Sue Shapiro, President Shapiro Travel Resources sue.shapiro@gmail.com www.shapirotravelresources.com
Travel Agent Professional has its roots in Home Based Trade, the first magazine of its kind, started by Joel Abels in 2004. Joel and Lenore Abels ran Travel Trade for nearly half a century – it was started by her grandfather, John S. Lewis, and her father, Sidney Lewis, in 1929, and they took the publication over after her grandfather’s passing. Under Joel’s direction, the company grew to be one of the travel agent industry’s leading publications, reaching more than 45,000 agents throughout North America. It spawned a famous series of trade shows and three monthly magazines – Cruise Trade, Tour Trade and Home Based Trade. The Abels also garnered enormous respect – Joel received the Neal Award, called “the Pulitzer Prize of the business press,” for his hard-hitting editorials. On a personal note, after working with Joel for over a decade and staying with him until the end, I grew to truly care for and respect the man. He was like a second father to me. Joel was old school, he stood by his word and believed in his work. There will never be another. While nobody can replace this industry legend, we’re hoping that this new publication, which reunites the original Home Based Trade editorial board, will be able to carry on his passion for travel and those who sell it.
Ann M. Hoek This online magazine is dedicated to the memory of Joel Abels, Travel Trade's editor and publisher. Joel and his life's work may be gone, but with your help it can live on.
The opinions expressed in these columns are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of Travel Agent Professional.
February 2016
Travel Agent Professional
4
Remaking Yourself —
C i n d y
A critical part of being successful in business today involves some key things. Keeping on top of trends, also the infa-
B e r t r a m
mous term of “changing with the times,” along with growing professionally as well as personally are ideas that tend to be thrown around. Another way to think of it? It’s critical not becoming obsolete, and no longer being needed. The best way to avoid becoming obsolete is to “remake” ourselves. This is a key way to continually grow a business, including travel businesses.
By Cindy Bertram Cindy's Inside Cruise & Travel Track, LLC
A Blast from the Past – Items that Faded Away Think back to some things you might have heard about as a kid, or perhaps even used 20 or 30 years ago. Do they still exist today or have those items and products disappeared? One that comes to mind is the infamous “Bag phone.” This was the first really transportable cellular phone, introduced by Motorola in 1990. Yes, they were large, and came with a battery pack, had a handset that attached to a transceiver (transmitter and receiver devise) and ran on a certain network. By 2008, however, the “Bag Phone” became obsolete. What happened? The debut of mobile devises and smart phones took hold of course, but another issue that came up with the “Bag phone”? The system network system company that these phones operated on completely shut down. So now the “Bag Phone” is strictly a collector’s item. Does anyone remember electronic typewriters? I had to take a mandatory typing class in school. Being left handed, it was a bit of a challenge. I had to learn to type with both hands, not just with my left hand. I got through it, but once again, today typewriters are obsolete. We use keyboards on desktop and laptop computers to create word documents, along with using tablets, and being able to type out messages on our smart phones. The written word has taken on a new dimension on how we successfully communicate in the world today.
February 2016
5
Success to Continually Grow Your Business
John Stachnik’s Successful Remake Story – Mayflower Tours John Stachnik, President and co-owner of Mayflower Tours first began his company over 35 years ago. Prior to that, he had worked nine years as a partner with owners of a small tour operator. But John decided he wanted to be independent and run his own company. He mentioned that he sold out on Friday and on the following Monday he started Mayflower Tours. When John launched Mayflower Tours, they operated domestic tours. Since then, John and his wife Mary, who he brought in as vice-president and co-owner, have continued to build on this by expanding and innovating. Today Mayflower Tours also provides and operates international land tours, as well as river cruises, ocean cruises and rail programs. When I spoke with John recently, I asked him what was behind his decision to take the company into the international scene. John explained, “The bread and butter of Mayflower Tours has been the motor coach tours as well as some domestic air tours within north America. But we started to make some transitions for the simplest of reasons. Over the years we built a very loyal following with our clients, but they also wanted to do more than domestic tours.”
Travel Agent Professional
6 The Successful Transitioning of Mayflower Tours When asked how Mayflower Tours made that successful turn in the road, John provided more details. He said, “At Mayflower Tours, we had a product that was serving half of our clients’ needs. The market made us rethink and remake our company by bringing on and offering international tours to grow beyond domestic tours. We actually started doing this about 25 years ago, but 15 years ago we also jumped into different markets.” As far as jumping into different markets, John further explained, “Rather than to offer tours that moved quickly, with a new city/location each day, we slowed it down. By offering tours where our clients could stay in a spot for a few days, and really explore and enjoy it via tours? It really created new experiences and was a great turn for us as far as our marketing and the positioning our company. Our clients were happy because it really cut down on the unpacking and repacking each day, and they had a chance to explore and enjoy the lay of the land.”
February 2016
7 Learning through Professional Associations During John’s time successfully running and operating Mayflower Tours for the past 35+ years, he has also served as chairman of the National Tour Association (NTA) along with being chairman of the U.S. Tour Operators Association (USTOA) twice. When I asked John how he managed to do this, he brought up some key things. First John said. “One of the integral parts of Mayflower Tours’ growth has been in the sophistication of our products. But thanks to the time I spent first being a member of USTOA and NTA, and then later being on their boards, I got to go places I never dreamed I would ever get to travel to. That has added so much.” John further expanded and said, “The amount of time I spent with other tour operators really helped broaden my horizons.”
Travel Agent Professional
8 John Stachnik’s Secret Weapon – Mary Stachnik! John also openly admits, “Another way to have success? I have a secret weapon who is Mary, my wife. When I asked her to join Mayflower Tours after first starting the company, she resisted initially. She was a successful real estate agent. But once she came on board, her experiences in real estate sales were great assets, and she put together a strong sales department.” John also mentions, “I did a lot of traveling for the business, especially when I was president of NTA and USTOA. But with Mary on hand, she was also there at the helm. A perfect example occurred on 9/11. I was in Northern Ireland speaking to 200 professionals and I couldn’t get home for a week. Mary was there to ‘save the company’ and having a partner that I can trust has also been a key part of the company’s success.”
Successfully Remaking Mayflower Tours John mentioned that successfully remaking Mayflower Tours has been a learning process. He explained, “The first big change came with offering international tours 25 years ago. 15 years ago we decided to also change and provide a different way of touring. And then, 9 years ago we decided to get into river cruising. We learned a lot in that process - our real success came with cruising on the Danube, the Dutch Waterways, and starting in Amsterdam. People like to unpack once and enjoy, and it was really a way to remarket ourselves.” As far as the river cruising, John further explained, “What we did was charter the river vessels so we could make it a true Mayflower Tour, by customizing things as well as having our own key people onboard. Why are we different when it comes to our river cruise packages? It’s the way we treat our guests. We bring on our own travel managers, change our itineraries, and customize our own tours.”
February 2016
9 Success with Re-branding and Growing In 2014, Mayflower Tours changed their tagline to “Life-Enriching Experiences” but decided to keep “Tours” in the company name. They also updated their company logo, placed it under a world map, and created a new, showier website, complete with photos, videos and blogs. And for the first time in Mayflower Tours’ history, in 2014 they had more revenue from international sales than their domestic tour sales. John provided more. He explained, “We kept the word ‘tours’ in our name because it’s a part of our company and brand. It’s like a certain restaurant, chain brand or store. You know what you’re going to get when you go there. In our case, tours is a part of who we are and our mindset. We’re still very strong in North America of course, but international is a key growth area for us as well.”
Travel Agent Professional
10 John’s Tips and insights for Travel Agent Professionals As travel agent professionals continue to learn, grow their businesses and evolve, John and I also discussed what tips he could provide for them to be successful, as well doing a “remake” of their respective businesses, if needed. John mentioned, “You can imagine that in my 46 years in the travel industry that I’ve talked to thousands of people in the industry. I’ve looked at what makes agencies more successful, and what I’ve see is they specialize in one type of travel, one destination.” He further noted, “It’s important to take a look at the different markets, as well as the mode of travel and specialize. For instance, I’ve seen very successful travel agents that are river cruise experts and they don’t do any ocean cruising bookings. Others might focus on honeymoons. Telling people that ‘we can take you anywhere you want to go’ is not realistic today.” John also shared an example of one specialization success story. This travel agent professional’s husband was an architect, so she started focusing on doing architectural tours, and it’s been very successful. John commented, “Specialization way is a good way to focus and this is a great example.”
A Few more Good Takeaways Years ago, the traditional travel agency model was the retail agency who sold airline tickets, booked tours, packages and cruises. But when airlines began cutting commissions they paid travel agencies, and later eliminated commissions completely, travel agencies/travel agent professionals had to go through some remakes. Focusing on products that still paid commissions was one. After the 9/11 tragedy, many travelers went into a “cocooning mode” – they just didn’t want to travel, many weren’t comfortable, and felt unsettled. But pent-up demand began to occur and during that time, travel professionals also went through a bit of a remake process as well to survive. John Stachnik’s points say it best. Continuing to be open to rebranding, specialization, growth with personalization and customization are key things travel agent professionals need to focus on, so they don’t become obsolete today.
February 2016
Travel Agent Professional
Showcase
Auto Europe Renews Maine Seafood Rewards Program for 16th Year Earn Line Maine Lobsters for Business Class Package Bookings Auto Europe, the industry’s first global car rental aggregator, has renewed the Maine Seafood Rewards program for Travel Agents for the 16th year. Agents booking round trip business class travel packages to Europe that include hotel and/or car services, qualify for this program. For each booking, travel agents may choose to enjoy three Maine lobsters or two pounds of salmon shipped fresh to their door. “We’ve renewed this unique incentive for the 16th year at the request of our Agent partners. The travel agent community has been the backbone of our business for over 60 years and we are excited to continue this reward program for them,” said Scott Braun, Auto Europe’s Chief Marketing Officer. “This is the only program of its kind in the industry. As a Maine based company with our headquarters overlooking the lobster wharf, we are proud to support our local lobstering community.” The Maine Seafood Rewards can be earned by the booking agent or by their client at the agent’s choice. The program is valid until December 31, 2016 for travel anytime in 2016 and is open only to US residents. For more information or to claim your rewards call 800-223-5555 or email tasales@autoeurope.com. About Auto Europe With over 60 years of experience in the rental car industry, Auto Europe specializes in helping travelers find the best car rental rates in Europe and other popular destinations around the world. Auto Europe’s deep understanding of the complexities of renting cars abroad paired with their knowledgeable team of rental specialists (available 24/7) allows Auto Europe to provide travelers with the highest quality service in the industry before, during and after their rental. To find the best rate on a car rental for your next trip abroad or to learn more about renting a car in Europe visit www.autoeurope.com.
1 . 8 0 0 . 2 2 3 . 5 5 5 5 • w w w. a u t o e u r o p e . c o m 39 Commercial St., P.O. Box 7006, Portland, ME 04112
14 The Cruise Line M i t c h e l l
The relationship between cruise lines and travel agents is
J .
chance to earn these profits is at its most advantageous
built on a model that drives profits for both partners and in 2016, perhaps more than at any previous time, the
S c h l e s i n g e r
opportunity. If you read the “wave” of announcements, cruise lines are committing significant dollars to upgrade their ships adding considerably more elements to their onboard products. Combined with destinations around the world, this provides travel sellers with the opportunity to upsell guests to higher level accommodations and participating in additional programs onboard and ashore. The New Years’ resolution for ALL travel agents should
By Mitchell J. Schlesinger President, MJS Consultants mjschlesinger@bellsouth.net
be to never aggressively promote inside staterooms. If a client wants to know, they will ask, but this is the era when value and experiential based marketing should start with promoting outside and balcony staterooms. Include opportunities for alternative restaurant dining, spa packages and experiential shore programs and the result is higher priced sales, more commission and profits.
The cruise industry is no different than other industry, service or consumer package goods in offering customers that opportunity to purchase their products directly. And I realize travel sellers can be concerned about this impacting their business and it won’t for 2 very good reasons:
•
In the cruise line business model, the relationship with travel sellers makes the cruise line business more efficient, effective….and profitable. Even at 15-30% direct, that still means the lines are depending on travel partners to provide 70-85% of guests!!
•
The cruise products are becoming so diverse, it provides travel sellers with an extraordinary variety of cruise products to promote to different demographic and psychographic audiences. The challenge for travel sellers is to PLAN, PLAN, PLAN in order to take advantage of multitudes of selling seasons and destinations. And in this electronic era it is critical that messaging is built on a feature/benefit basis structuring the personal reward of the experience to clients.
February 2016
15 & Travel Agency Profit Partnership The ability to capitalize on higher priced sales that yield more profit requires travel sellers to appeal to the ASPIRATIONAL desires of clients. One of the best ways to understand that is to look at other industries. In 2016 it is estimated that 25% of all cars will be leased, the highest level ever! An integral aspect of this growth is the opportunity to drive a more upscale care without having to put down a large down payment. The same applies to furniture. Rooms-to-Go has become highly skilled at selling $2 - $5,000 sets of furniture that includes big screen televisions and giving customers the opportunity to make interest free payments over a multi-year period. They understand that customers want nicer goods and services and will spend more. Marketing and selling travel is no different. Why would you ever want to sell something that costs less, yields less commission and profit? Every client you upsell enhances your business and strengthens the profit partnership with your preferred cruise partners. And this serves to also strengthen your reputation as a travel brand known for the expertise to fulfill the type of experiences to which your clients aspire.
Travel Agent Professional
Showcase AMG is Delighted to Add Brian King of Marriott International to its Distinguished Speaker List at Global Travel Market 2016 It is a privilege to add Brian J. King, Global Officer Marriott Signature Brands & Global Sales Marriott International as a speaker for agents and
About American
preferred suppliers at the 2016 Travel Market conference, June 9-12, 2016,
Marketing Group:
at the JW Marriott, Desert Springs Resort & Spa. Additional featured speak-
American
ers at the conference include premier industry leaders and thought provok-
Group, Inc. is the parent
ing motivational speakers.
company of 18 leading
Marketing
The conference is organized by American Marketing Group (AMG), the
travel brands around the
parent company of TRAVELSAVERS and NEST (Network of Entrepreneurs
globe, including TRAV-
Selling Travel).
ELSAVERS, NEST (The
Brian is Global Brand Officer for Marriott Signature Brands and Global
Network of Entrepreneurs
Sales Officer at Marriott International. He is responsible for providing
Selling
strategic leadership and management oversight to Marriott’s Global Sales
Affluent
Organization (GSO).
Collection, Well-Being
Brian’s experiences and insights on brand positioning, strategic planning and building relationships are sure to inspire everyone.
Travel),
The
Traveler
Travel,
Acclaim
Meetings,
TRAVEL-
A native of Milwaukee, WI, King is a notable speaker and panelist at
SAVERS Partner Services,
many industry conferences and summits and is a frequently quoted expert
TWIN (TRAVELSAVERS
in major media such as USA Today, The New York Times, The Wall Street
Worldwide Independent
Journal and Time Magazine.
Network), Forte Business
“Travel agents play an essential and valuable role in the travel industry
Travel Solutions, travel
and I am excited to meet and engage with agents attending the 2016 Travel
tix, Travstar Technologies,
Market conference,” said King. “This will be an opportunity to further
cruiseexpress, TRAVEL
demonstrate Marriott’s commitment to the travel agent community – espe-
HELPLINE and agent24.
cially our partnership with TRAVELSAVERS and NEST and their members.”
Independent travel agen-
“Having Brian King at our conference will be timely, engaging and infor-
cies in 35 countries are
mative as the leader of the Global Sales team for an iconic and ever grow-
part of the organization
ing hotel company that includes our host property, the magnificent JW
and generate more than
Marriott, Desert Springs,” says Nicole Mazza, Chief Marketing Officer,
$20 billion in annual
TRAVELSAVERS and NEST.
travel industry sales.
For information about registration fees, activities and more visit: http://travelmarket.americanmarketinggroup.com.
February 2016
NO ONE CAN SHOW YOUR CLIENTS THE WORLD LIKE ROYAL CARIBBEAN
When you send your clients on a Royal Caribbean cruise, you’re not just giving them a world-class adventure. You’re sending them on a vacation that will give them the same special treatment you do. That’s why Travel Weekly has voted us Best Overall 12 years running. And why your client will want to come back and cruise with us (and you) again and again. So choose confidently. Choose Royal Caribbean. INNOVATIVE SHIPS From our FlowRider® wave simulator, to our rock-climbing-wall, to live shows straight from the stages of Broadway, Royal Caribbean consistently pushes the bar with award-winning ships that give a richer more memorable experience to clients of all ages.
AMAZING DESTINATIONS With 2Ć ships sailing every major sea on the globe to 240 incredible destinations in 72 countries on 6 continents, Royal Caribbean offers customized, exclusive shore excursions that give your clients the best of each destination. WORLD-CLASS SERVICE With all the changes and advancements we’ve made over the last 40 years, one thing has remained constant — our commitment to giving your clients the personalized Gold Anchor Service only found on Royal.
Visit www.LoyaltoYouAlways.com, our exclusive travel partner hub, to see up-to-the-minute offers, latest news, and easy to use marketing resources.
12
YEARS RUNNING
©2015 Royal Caribbean Cruises Ltd. Ships registry: The Bahamas. 15043752 • 04/10/2015
BEST CRUISE LINE OVERALL Travel Weekly Readers’ Choice Awards 2003 – 2014
7
YEARS RUNNING
BEST SALES & SERVICE Travel Weekly Readers’ Choice Awards 2008 – 2014