Dic Marxen, president and CEO of CCRA, talks about the company's acquisition of the Outside Sales Support Network (OSSN) and its TRUE agency accreditation code and how CCRA has evolved from a hotel program with a call center to a marketplace for booking hotels, air and tours around the world.
Q: How would you describe CCRA today?
A: Today we are an international commerce network. In addition to the two original divisions, we have several more revenue divisions and departments. We have an air division divided up into two departments. One is for our commercial agencies that have GDSs. That is our Air Select Direct, and they're using our contracts that we have negotiated with carriers. They get the full tier commission and also get the segment fees when they do the booking under our contracts. The second air department is Air Select Central for non-GDS agencies. It is a booking engine that gives them the chance to book flights and receive, once again, top-tier commissions. We do the audits, we do the tracking, we provide the management reports.
Q: Do agents need their own ARC numbers for these bookings?
A: This is a booking made under CCRA's number, although they have to have a TRUE, VTC or CLIA number. They do have to go through a vetting process.
Q: Why did CCRA buy OSSN last spring?
A: We wanted to access leisure agencies. OSSN has a pretty big base, 8,000 agencies, and 99% are leisure. Now we have a distribution channel for leisure agencies. We have every intention of growing OSSN and the TRUE code in the U.S. Our membership is running [at] about a 10% increase already.
Q: Was there any other reason for buying OSSN?
A: Here is the second part that we didn't tell anybody until now: We are going to take the TRUE code international. We are going to Mexico, South Africa, Canada and Argentina.
Q: What's the benefit of taking TRUE international?
A: It means we give the agents in, say, Mexico access to all of our suppliers, 40,000 hotels. Conversely, when we have suppliers in Mexico, we will give them access to all of our agents in the U.S. Now we've got agents in the U.S. who are going to have access to suppliers that otherwise they wouldn't even have known about. There is an African safari company which is doing quite well in the local market. They are very excited about becoming a supplier member of TRUE International and having access to our U.S. agency base. We're going to help those [foreign] suppliers market to their local markets, but we're also going to be able to distribute their ads and webinars and other collateral to those 8,000 [TRUE] agents in the U.S.
Q: How are suppliers responding to TRUE International?
A: One of the most interesting things that happened, and we hoped that it would happen, is it exploded. We have had hotels come to us. They are trying to reach our base of U.S. agencies.
Q: Do you help suppliers with marketing?
A: We develop emails for suppliers, we help them develop collateral and webinars, we host webinars, we get speakers for them and we do co-hosting of shows. We now have our own pavilions [at trade shows] where we'll bring in suppliers.