Tenn. agent proves timing isn’t everything

By Laura Del Rosso

Muffett Grubb is one travel agent who made lemonade from a load of lemons, as the saying goes, when the economy plummeted along with the stock market five years ago. It was 2008 when Grubb decided to follow her dream and open a Cruise Holidays franchise agency from her home in Knoxville, Tenn. The following months were a test of her commitment to the business.

“I bought my franchise two weeks before the market crashed and I looked it at this way: There was nowhere for things to go but up at that point,” she said. “I took the attitude that the slow time was a good time to get my feet wet and gradually learn the business.”
Since then, business has been all up for Grubb, who previously worked in purchasing and marketing for a national retail chain. She recently received Cruise Holiday's “Best Customer Service Award” based on an incident that took place in Alaska last summer when a cruise ship was idled by propulsion problems. Unable to leave port for four days, Grubb’s 20 clients were left with nothing to do, along with 2,000 other passengers who scrambled to book excursions.

Using industry connections and Cruise Holidays programs, Grubb booked her clients on shore excursions to make the most of their four days in Alaska. She also rebooked their future cruise, which was fully paid for by the cruise line as part of a compensation package.

It's part of the services that Grubb says she provides that she hopes set her apart from direct, online bookings. “I often have to explain to people how a travel agent works, that it doesn't cost them more money to use a travel agent. This is the value I provide. These are the things I do for my clients. Once I have a client they generally are my client forever.”

Grubb credits her success with networking. Shortly after opening the franchise, she joined a local business group in Knoxville and spread the word among a wide circle of family and friends that she was open for business. Many people already knew she loved to plan travel, long before she opened the agency.

“I used to plan trips for friends or friends of friends just because I had a passion for it. A few times I planned cruises and just put the word out and got as many as 16 people signed up for a cruise. That's when I started thinking of making it a second career.”

Grubb looked at different types of business models for her travel agency and settled on Cruise Holidays because it matched her cruise expertise. Also, she said, the franchise system offers the technology and back-office systems that enable her to concentrate on sales and not administration. Now her business has grown to the point that she is considering expanding and hiring staff. And office space may also be in the picture at some point.

“The beauty of starting a home-based agency is that there was a low initial outlay because I'm not paying rent. It afforded me time to build my business. Now I'm at the point that I realize I can't do it all myself.”

In the last couple of years, Grubb has evolved her social media marketing and has gained new customers, mostly on Facebook. However, she doesn't promote herself with a “hard sell,” she says.

“I do a lot on Facebook, but it's mainly posting about my trips and sharing what my clients have done on their trips. It's not an aggressive marketing technique but a casual way of saying ‘here's where I've gone’ to generate a conversation. Then people will call and tell me they saw I went somewhere that interests them, and I've got a sale.”

Exploring expert fee models

By Kate Rice

Revenue is the real top line

Travel agency revenue is different from sales. It includes commissions, fees, override bonuses and net price markups.

Sales represent the amount of money clients pay the agency for a cruise, hotel or other travel product. Most of this, less any commission earned, is passed on to the supplier.

Robert Joselyn, president of Travel Agency Management Systems, put it this way: "Sell a cruise for $5,000, and that is $5,000 in sales for the agency and $5,000 in revenue for the cruise line. If an agency makes a 10% commission, the agency revenue is $500."

Agencies still are defined by their sales volume, mainly out of habit, a holdover from the days when the commission-only model reigned supreme. When commission rates rarely or never changed, it was a stable and easy-to-understand measurement, said Nolan Burris, president of Visionistics Enterprises.

But, said Burris, in today's agency environment, revenue is a far more accurate measure of an agency's productivity. Today, he said, he sees agencies getting the bulk of their revenue from fees instead of from commissions or overrides.-- K.R. 

Commission-based sales, the traditional revenue model of the travel retailer, continue to fade as suppliers shrink their percentages or compete with tight discounting. So savvy agents are turning to the one revenue model that enables them to determine their own margins: professional fees.

Unlike traditional transaction fees for services like booking airline tickets, agents who embrace a professional fees model are charging for their brainpower. In some cases, fees are already accounting for between 10% and 50% of revenue, and that share is widely expected to grow in the future.

Depending on the size, duration, complexity and nature of the travel being planned and sold -- and depending, too, on the level of expertise required to assemble a given vacation -- those fees can add up to as much as hundreds, thousands or even tens of thousands of dollars for a single trip.

There are several fee models from which to choose: flat fees, hourly fees, access fees, membership fees, even subscription fees. They can also be described variously as consulting fees, professional fees or planning fees. But whatever they are called, fees are designed to achieve the same result: leverage an agent's expertise to achieve fatter bottom lines and increased respect from clients.

They often also result in higher self-esteem for agents who embrace the professional fees model because the model attracts only clients who value the retailer's knowledge and professionalism.
Nolan Burris, president of Visionistics Enterprises of Vancouver, said he has witnessed a steady shift toward professional fees in the past several years. Between five and seven years ago, he estimated, fees rarely approached more than 15% of revenue. Today, he sees leisure-only agencies charging fees that account for between 40% and 60% of revenue.

ASTA reports that more than 60% of its members charge for planning FITs, while the number of agencies charging fees overall has increased to 85% in 2012 from 64% in 1999. While the ASTA numbers include transaction fees for booking airline tickets, they also include fees for booking hotels, all-inclusives, tours, cruises, ancillary services, shore excursions and car rentals.

Brownell Travel, a Virtuoso member based in Birmingham, Ala., with about $100 million in annual sales, instituted the adviser model six or seven years ago, positioning its agents as professional travel consultants who charge for their services. Since then, the agency, which has three offices and associates in 20 states, has seen its revenue increase by 50% per staffer, according to Brownell President Troy Haas.

Haas said that the change to the adviser model increased overall productivity and has resulted in better pay for everyone on the team.

That's important, said Robert Joselyn, president and CEO of Travel Agency Management Systems in Scottsdale, Ariz., a financial benchmarking and networking group of agencies. Typically, Joselyn said, commissions do not give agencies a rational return on their business investment.

Eric Maryanov, president of All-Travel.com. a Los Angeles-based agency that is a member of the Signature Travel Group, attributes part of that to noncommissionable fees (NCFs). As a result of NCFs, he said, cruise commissions have shrunk to the point that a $6,000 or $7,000 cruise commission is now less than 10%, even though All-Travel is technically performing at a 16% commission level.

Nor do commissions enable agents to make the kind of living they ought to earn given their expertise, skill set and the time they spend acquiring those skills, Joselyn said.
"Supplier revenue doesn't cover the time the travel agent spends providing the service to the customer," he said, adding that FITs are the perfect example of how irrational the commission model has become. They can take hours of time, but many of an FIT's components generate no commissions, small commissions or irregularly paid commissions.

Charging consulting fees for building an FIT, on the other hand, brings rationality to agency compensation, he said.

In addition, fees decrease agencies' vulnerability to suppliers' whims. Relying only on commissions puts the entire financial well-being of a business into the hands of another business that has very different priorities.

"It makes your business susceptible to their financial pressures, shareholder demands, corporate restructuring and supplier industry changes," Burris said. "One boardroom decision in the middle of the night and your entire business can be thrown into turmoil. Anyone who lived through the airline commission cuts, caps and eventual elimination remembers that period."

In addition to introducing financial stability and independence to travel agencies, the fees model contributes to a self-perpetuating, positive cycle.

"They are the vehicle for establishing us in the client's eyes as a professional, and that is the most important thing that fees do," Haas said. "At the end of the day, the adviser is happier, more productive and working less with the people who do not value you and working more with the people who do."

Even agencies that get the bulk of their leads from the Internet -- the most price-sensitive channel -- are charging professional fees. All-Travel.com does most of its marketing online and sells cruises. The Web is a great commoditizer, narrowing consumer focus on price, and cruises are a very competitive product to sell, attracting some very price-focused customers.

But All-Travel has long charged a booking management fee, and All-Travel is very clear about what the fee is for.

"It is for professional consultation and advocacy throughout the booking process," Maryanov said.

Generally, resistance to fees tends to come more from the agent community rather than from consumers.

"Travel advisers are their own worst enemy," Haas said. "Clients have many, many fewer problems with fees than agents."

Diana Hechler, owner of D. Tours Larchmont, N.Y., a member of the Ensemble Travel Group, instituted fees when she opened her agency in 1999. Ever since, she said, she has had customers who ask of the fees, "Is that all?"

On the other hand, shifting to the professional fees model is not simply a matter of owners telling agents to do so. It requires preparation and training.

First, agents have to recognize their value.

"We are an industry of caregivers, and caregivers don't value themselves as highly as they should," Maryanov said. "We always want to take care of people and fix their problems. There's nothing wrong with that, but if you're bringing value, people will pay for it."

And Hechler observed that to achieve success with the fees model, "You really have to believe in your heart that you are solving people's problems."
Victoria Boomgarden, president of the luxury travel division of Best Travel Gold, a Virtuoso agency in Naperville, Ill., has agents go through specialist training so they can internalize why they are charging a fee and not merely "parroting back what I say."

To help agents see the value that they provide, Joselyn conducts workshops in which he has them log all of what they do for clients, much like lawyers do for per-hour fees. He has agents log the date, exactly what they did, the value that added to the client's vacation and how much time they spent doing it.

"They start forgetting themselves that they are doing all these good things," Joselyn said, adding that the exercise helps them articulate the value they bring to the customer.

Joselyn's workshops include exercises in which agents explain the reasons for charging fees and create responses to objections customers might raise.

Brownell provides agents with a short list of what each of them does, as a way of helping them explain their value.

"It just goes back to being confident in stating your 30-second commercial and not be offended when asked what you do to justify a $300 fee," he said.

The goal in all these training exercises is to raise the agent's self-image.

"Once advisers start charging fees, what it does for their morale is amazing," Joselyn said. "You just see them blossom."

Follow Kate Rice on Twitter @krtravelweekly.
 

Examples of agencies' fee models

Fee models and the amounts they generate can vary from $50 to $60,000. Agents might charge flat fees, hourly fees, member fees or subscriptions. Many charge several types of fees. Some post them on their websites, while others explain them to customers after they call. What they all have in common is that they are charges that clients are paying for their time and knowledge.

Brownell Travel

Martha Gaughen, vice president of Brownell Travel, has charged as much as $60,000 in consulting fees for a major trip.

Brownell has made collaborative planning the foundation of its business model with Discover More, a five-point plan whose tenets are discover, design, connect, experience and share -- everything from planning the trip to sharing the experience of the trip once it's over.

Brownell uses a worksheet to calculate fees for different parts of a trip, which can be anything from hotel reservations to theater tickets. The agency can also charge hourly fees.

Gaughen said she will often will use net pricing and charge a fee of 25% of that net price. She finds this works particularly well when she is using an on-site provider, a tour operator or any travel provider who will offer her net pricing. She has clients who point out that she earns commissions on her hotel booking. She responds that those commissions do not pay her adequately.

"I am worth more than that," Gaughen said.

The beauty of net pricing is that her clients will never find the products or services she has created for them at a lower price online, if they can find them at all. She works closely with providers and clients to ensure that clients are getting exactly what they want. She'll ask providers if what they're offering is essential to the quality of the clients' experience. She'll work to keep within the clients' budget but also go back to clients if the provider thinks that a certain experience is worth going over budget.

Because Brownell has a fee schedule, clients are always clear on what they're paying for.

"There is no gray area," she said. When her clients see the prices she can get for them and see the added value she can provide, they pay her fees willingly. That's when they see the value of a fee of $4,000, $10,000 or, in one instance, $60,000 for a major trip that included components such as private planes, Gaughen said.

Best Travel Gold

Best Travel Gold, a Virtuoso member, has a graduated series of fees. Best Travel interviews potential clients, charges them an access fee and then assigns them an hourly fee based on they agent they are assigned to work with. The agency's hourly fees start at $150 but can go far higher, depending on the type of travel and who their adviser is, said Victoria Boomgarden, president of the luxury travel division of Best Travel Gold. Fees for after-hours services can be double or triple the fees for services provided within office hours. Best Travel Gold is happy to accommodate its travelers after hours but makes sure that its agents are appropriately compensated for that service.

Andrew Harper

The Andrew Harper agency, a member of American Express, uses a subscription model, providing its 22,000 subscribers with a variety of publications, both print and online, to which they can subscribe as well as access to its travel office. "The Hideaway Report gets you to dream," said Lorelei Calvert, the agency's COO. About 35% of subscribers use the travel office, which makes money on its subscriptions and on commissions for the travel its agents book.

In the Know Experiences

In the Know Experiences, a Virtuoso agency based in New York City, initially offered trip-planning fees but then had some clients who traveled frequently suggest that they pay the agency an annual fee to handle them and their families, according to co-founder Seth Kaplan. The agency started out on a per-trip fee model, charging $350 per person for domestic trips and $400 to $450 per person for international trips. That covered trip planning, 24/7 customer service, customized itineraries and high-touch service. When booking large families or larger groups, In the Know will adjust those fees. The agency now has about 30 clients who pay membership fees, which start at $10,000 for a couple or a family with children and range up to $30,000.

D. Tours Travel

Diana Hechler, owner of D. Tours Travel, posts her fees on her website. She charges $300 for up to four reservations to cover her time and expertise. If a trip takes an additional amount of work, she charges an additional reservation-management fee of $40. She also charges a $50 airline-booking fee. If she is booking a group -- for example, a family reunion at a villa or on a cruise -- she'll just charge the $300 fee because she will make money on that group. Her fee schedule gives her the flexibility to charge more for any trips that are particularly labor-intensive.

MoonRings Travel

MoonRings Travel in Chicago, a member of the Ensemble Travel Group, publishes its fees on its website. They are based on the number of destinations on an itinerary as well as on the length of the trip. Fees start at $150 for a single-destination trip of under eight days in the U.S., Canada, Caribbean and Mexico, and can go as high as $625 for trips of 30 days or more in Europe, New Zealand, much of Asia and other parts of the world. "My business partner and I came out of management consulting, and it seemed obvious that if you offer a specialist service, you would want to charge some sort of fee," said Carrie Wallace, president of MoonRings, which specializes in honeymoons and special-occasions travel. "We knew that once a client has agreed to a fee, they have agreed to working with you. It is sort of a financial and psychological hook." -- K.R.