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What Would The World’s Best Travel Consultant Do?

Richard Earls,
Travel Research Online

Like the TV quiz show Jeopardy, where the answers are provided and guests have to give the correct question, it’s often helpful to turn your thinking around. By focusing on the outcome rather than the process, obstacles take on secondary importance to results...read on

How To Be An ‘Insanely Great’ Agent

Richard Earls,
Travel Research Online

None of us begins our careers planning to be average. Most of us set out with ambition, passion and a vision of greatness. Sometimes that gets lost along the way, but with four easy steps you can change your course back towards the right direction...read on

What Are You Thinking, Carnival?

John Frenaye,
Travel Research Online

Travel agent and columnist John Frenaye questions a newly enforced Carnival policy of requiring all luggage to be unlocked and accessible so ship porters can search for anything deemed contraband....read on

The Continuing Importance Of FAM Trips

Steve Cousino,
Travel Research Online

FAM trips play a big part in the development of a travel counsellor. More than ever, agents need firsthand knowledge just to keep up with their Internet-researching clients. To make a trip successful, agents need to be professional, and suppliers should focus on the experience, not just a blur of hotel rooms...read on

Only Passengers & Masochists Past This Point

Scott Feschuk, Macleans

You are now entering the Transportation Security Administration screening zone. Only passengers and masochists are permitted past this point. Signs have been positioned to help estimate wait times. Senior citizens are permitted to join the lineup only if their affairs are in order...read on

Positive Articles Tell Half The Story

Mark Murphy,
TravelPulse

Retail travel agents have earned lots of good press in the past couple of years, as the pendulum has begun to swing back after years of predictions that agents would disappear altogether. But by suggesting that using agents costs more, most recent coverage is missing the mark...read on

Small Businesses Just Can’t Compete On Price

Mike Driscoll,
Travel Market Report

It may be easier for some agencies to charge fees than others, based on the demographics of their client base. But the reality is that in today’s market, small- and mid-sized businesses simply can’t compete on price while earning a decent margin. If you’re providing good service, fees are essential...read on

The Lasting Bonds Of Travel

Arnie Weissmann,
Travel Weekly

Reflecting on a trip to Haiti last year, a travel journalist says the understanding of peoples, history and culture we get when visiting a country bonds us to it in a very personal way. It’s one reason many of us prefer to collect travel experiences over consumer goods...read on

Happy To Help, For A Fee

Chuck Flagg,
Travel Research Online

Agents can willingly give away up to 90% of their knowledge for free, but the remaining 10% of ‘Google-proof’ insider information is extremely valuable and should be treated as such. Your clients don’t know what they don’t know, and what you know is worth a premium to them...read on

Time Is Of The Essence

Richard Earls,
Travel Research Online

You wouldn’t waste a professional’s time yourself, so why let customers waste yours? If you’ve been an accomplice to letting too many people waste your time, it’s your time to take control. Let go of the bad clients and keep the ones that value your time – and will pay for it...read on

How Long Will Low Sun Prices Last?

Nina Slawek, Take Off eh

Sunwing’s Lawrence Elliott says Canadians may be in for some serious sticker shock when the U.S. economy improves and the bargain basement sun vacation prices of the last two winters start heading north...read on