y the time the zero-commissions
torpedo hit, no one was home at PR Travel. Pamela Courtney, the
agency's owner, already had adapted to the changed environment by
moving from a storefront in White House, Tenn., into cyberspace.
"We love it," said Courtney of her Web-based operation, which
she operates from home. "We're not mad because the airlines don't
pay. We make more money than ever."
By "we," Courtney means her husband, Rusty, and "my right-hand
person," agent Joanie Davis.
With no walls, PR has broadened its dimensions. It has eight
agents who work as independent contractors from New York to Texas.
The agency doesn't even bother to book airlines anymore.
"We stopped doing them, except for Southwest," she said. "We
don't do any of the big boys. We just refer [ticket-seeking
clients] to a different agency."
PR Travel doesn't miss airline commissions because it has "great
supplier relationships," Courtney said.
A large part of the agency's bread and butter comes from booking
groups. It already has a group of 200 booked for a trip to Ireland
in March. Many of the customers booked on that trip also will go on
a rail tour in Montana planned for October. Groups are booked into
2004.
But it doesn't stop with groups.
"We do individual travelers, honeymoons, and we're a Sandals
specialist," she said. "We sell vacation packages. We sell a
tremendous number of cruises. We do Las Vegas, and we do a lot of
Trafalgar Tours."
The agency, she said, builds strong client relationships by
delivering extraordinary service and hunting down the best
deals.
"We are into where the money is and where we can do the most for
clients," she said. "Nine times out of 10 we can get a package for
what they could get that airline ticket for. You have to work at
it. We work seven days a week. Clients have our cell phone number.
We're accessible 24 hours a day, and if they have a problem, we
won't stop until we get it fixed."
The initials PR in PR Travel stand for personal relationships.
"We offer a level of customer service they wouldn't easily find
anymore," she said.
Rusty Courtney, who helps the agency with public relations and
technology, created the agency's Web system. It consists of two
elements: a private, secure intranet through which business is
coordinated with the outside agents, and a public site, which
shatters the limits of PR's small-town Tennessee environment.
"We have clients in France and Italy and scattered all over the
U.S.," Pamela Courtney said. "The Internet has brought this to
us."
She estimated about 100 leads a month come in via the Internet.
During the last quarter, PR Travel did $400,000 worth of
business.
Since the agency doesn't book airline tickets, it doesn't need a
GDS and has none of the associated expense, either.
"We book either through travel agent Web sites, such as VAX, or
by telephone," she said.
She plans to return eventually to having a storefront -- but
this time with a new twist. "I'm going to remain home-based until
our town grows a little," she said. "Then we're going to open a
Paris-style cafe and put our agency in there. So when people are
drinking their cafe au lait, they can read a travel magazine and
talk about travel."
-- David Cogswell
Just for the love of it
hen Pamela Courtney, owner of
PR Travel in White House, Tenn., became an agent in 1995, she was
an improbable candidate facing an uncertain future in an industry
that was coming unwound.
Airline commissions had begun their downward spiral, and a cloud
of doom hung over the retail industry.
But predictions of the demise of travel agents didn't deter
her.
Having been a nurse for 18 years, she knew all about illness and
recovery. Besides, she loved travel, and travel to her seemed like
the perfect second career.
"You see so much sickness as a nurse, and people who are so
unhappy," said Courtney. "Working with someone who is going on
vacation and getting to be a part of someone's dream -- it's the
greatest thing I've ever done."
Courtney's interest in travel as a career was piqued when a
patient came into the office to have blood drawn. The patient
happened to be the doctor's travel agent. In the course of
conversation, Courtney asked her if there was a school for travel
agents.
Courtney recalls that day: "She said, 'You can go to school, but
I don't recommend it. If you are really interested, I'll teach you
everything I know.' And she did."
Courtney left nursing to work as a travel agent. Soon she was
managing the agency, and three years ago, with four years of
management experience under her belt, she started PR Travel.
"I'm not a fly-by-night agent," she said. "I'm not here for the
fam trips; I'm here for the knowledge. It's just a passion. You
have to have a love for it, or you won't survive. I will be with it
until they tell me I can't do it." -- D.C.
CRM: The mantra
ne doesn't have to look very
far to determine what is the hottest new industry buzzword.
Customer relationship management is sweeping the back travel
offices of America, and anyone who is anyone has signed on for the
program.
It's not a bad idea, but one has to wonder about the state of
our industry when its practitioners have to be told that it might
be a really good idea to keep some sort of list of their
clients.
And, oh yes, it might be a good idea to arrange that list by
preferences and characteristics like income.
Next, we'll be told that it's really a good idea for agents to
remember to offer travelers a return air ticket so they can get
back to the place where their trip began.
Like so
many other industry buzzwords, CRM is a bit of a bill of goods. The
premise is that you can predict future travel behavior on the basis
of past travel behavior.
On the surface, this is reasonable, but in practice this dog
won't hunt. Is there empirical evidence that a family that has done
two Caribbean cruises won't want to see Paris? Can we assume that
clients who love Istanbul will never want to ski in Aspen?
Destination categorizing is, I think, a more slippery slope than
income profiling. The ultra-deluxe client does not suddenly decide
to try the vibrating bed in a Motel 4 -- not unless he's up to
something.
You know what really bothers me about the new trend toward CRM?
It is a kind of diversion because it implies that statistical
analysis can, somehow, replace personal knowledge. I'd like to
suggest that there are at least two levels to knowing a client.
There is no doubt that you have to collect data about your
clients.
You need to know as much about them as possible. You need to be
prepared to produce, almost instantly, a series of mailing labels
or e-mail addresses for clients with a statistical propensity to
attend the worldwide poetry reading championship in Las Vegas. In
that way your mailing will be supported by co-op funds. You have a
financial partner, a grateful supplier. That's good.
But that's only Level 1. To really know your clients, you need
to know their family, their friends; you need to be there when they
are sick. At Level 2, you have to spend time talking to your
clients, and who has the time to do that in a transaction-based
business with an average sale of $362?
So here's the trick.
You have to do far fewer transactions and get your average sale
up over $2,000, so that spending time with your clients is not a
luxury, it's a necessity.
And if you reach Level 2, watch how easy it is to shine at
CRM.
Richard Turen owns Churchill & Turen, a leisure travel
agency. He also is managing director of the Churchill Group, a
sales and marketing training firm. Contact him at [email protected].