FORT LAUDERDALE — A panel of executives from host agencies gathered onstage at CruiseWorld to talk to the agent audience about about the benefits of membership. But don't just take their word for it.
In a twist, each panelist called up a card-carrying, "superstar" member of their organization to expound on their relationships and success with their host agency.
And agents participating in the “My Best Business Decision” panel said that they had chosen, or stayed, with hosts because their interests were intertwined. Many were looking for back-office solutions to free them up to concentrate on sales and service, and several mentioned the community and support they've received from their host.
“I looked at many companies,” said Cruise Planners agent Michael Consoli in describing his entry into retail travel 12 years ago. “Cruise Planners was the only one whose business was really built on my success and not on selling me tools to make me successful.”
He told his interviewer, Cruise Planners COO Vicki Garcia, that the organization's tools let him "focus on selling and building my business instead of accounting or marketing."
He praised Cruise Planners University training and the ability to network with other successful agents. He said he "didn’t have a clue" about the industry when he started.
Similarly, Gary Smith, a CruiseOne franchisee and small-business management professor at Lane Community College in Eugene, Ore., said that he, too, had “shopped around” a lot before he chose CruiseOne 10 years ago.
“I saw a lull in the market after 9/11 and a bounce-back opportunity,” he said.
Smith teaches his students to do due diligence and said that he looked for strengths such as marketing, IT and business tools.
That drew him to CruiseOne, he said while onstage with Debbie Fiorino, senior vice president of CruiseOne/Cruises Inc. But, he said, it was the intangibles such as leadership that have kept him there for 10 years.
Deborah Fogarty of Be Well Travel in Pembroke Pines, Fla., told Jackie Friedman, president of Nexion, that she had worked as a personal assistant at a brick-and-mortar agency, and that with her “entrepreneurial experience and passion for yoga” she wanted her own business but also wanted great back-office support and a great team.
She said that she had found that with Nexion.
Fogarty praised the training, marketing, technology and supplier relationships that help her with her business. But intangibles were key for her, as well. Of the Nexion staff, she said, "It motivates me every day to be working with people who are proud of me."
April Hicks, a registered nurse who owns Family Memories Travel in Cumming, Ga., told Meredith Hill, founder of the Global Institute for Travel Entrepreneurs and the Gifted Travel Network (GTN), said that GTN’s financial model, in which she pays a monthly fee and keeps all of her commissions, meant she earned an additional $11,000 in commissions since she joined in April compared with what she had earned with with her previous host.
She told the audience she gets encouragement and support from GTN.
“They have encouraged me to think outside the box,” she said, and she added that GTN’s “work smarter, not harder” techniques gave her more time to deliver more personalized service.
Sue Ratliff of Sea the World Cruises & Tours in Athens, Texas, told Scott Koepf, vice president of sales at Avoya Travel, that she and her husband, Ernie, had joined Avoya when it was still named America's Vacation Center, after working independently for a year.
Ratliff said that Avoya’s Live Leads program means she has customers all over the world. She now specializes in selling several luxury ocean cruise lines and a few “very special” river cruises.
She described Avoya’s technology as “outstanding.” When on her own, Ratliff said she had used Quickbooks and described it as “not quick; it just slowed me down.”
Ratliff said that using Avoya’s leads and technology, she booked $4.2 million worth of business last year.
View a video recap of Day 1 of CruiseWorld.