[Travelandtourism] Good news on the Health of the Home Based Travel Agency market for 2012 and beyond

[Mary Donahue]

Thanks for the post, Cheryl. I know I am considering being a travel
professional after I retire from my Braille proofreading job. I am sure that
working in the hotel/hospitality industry is a plus, as far as customer
service goes.

Mary Donahue


-----Original Message-----
From: travelandtourism-bounces at nfbnet.org
[mailto:travelandtourism-bounces at nfbnet.org] On Behalf Of cheryl echevarria
Sent: Wednesday, January 11, 2012 1:43 PM
To: travelandtourism
Subject: [Travelandtourism] Good news on the Health of the Home Based Travel
Agency market for 2012 and beyond


Reading my latest issue of Agent at Home Magazine that just came out. It
looks very promising for our field.
Thank goodness for that.
With the growth of Home Based Businesses like your truly and for Anahit
LaBarre and Maurice Shackelford, since we own our own Home Based Agenies,
there is room for competition.
Since many people on this list and others have asked in the past about
getting into this business, this is a good sign.
I would recommend prior to getting into our business there are some things
that you should do first.
If you have great customer service skills, math skills, a great sense of
humor, this is on your side.
No, you do not have to go to college and take Hospitality 101 to go into
this business.  You do however, need to do a lot of reading, a lot of
learning on your own, before you even open your mouth and say hey I am a
travel agent.
You should definitely, if you have never been a travel professional, is to
start out with a good and I mean a good host agency, there are plenty out
there that are phony, and should look and check them out. Both Maurice and I
started with hosts agencies, I just got away on my own, but there are draw
back from leaving them as well. Meaning lower commissions, and you are your
own boss.
That is a positive and a negative.
But you have to remember, and I am still trying to stick to my convictions,
is to set your working hours for your customers and for you to relax and do
the rest of your life.  Working from home, I get up at 6AM and sometimes not
off the computer until 7pm, and my  house looks like a bomb went off, I know
because my husband tells me so.
You also need to know, is that you are a travel agent, and you need to
travel, again, trying to put that into my husband mind, but he says well we
just came back from a cruise, well we are not cruise planners, we are travel
agents.  We need to travel.
I say we, but it is me.  So, if you can find someone who wants to travel
with you. That would be great.
Learn learn learn, I am still learning, I have just booked a few clients to
italy and no nothing about it, accept for what everyone else knows about it,
so I am reading up all about it.
You need to know what you are selling to sell it.
So don't let people say that the Travel Agent is dead, far from it.


Leading the Way in Independent Travel!

Cheryl Echevarria
http://www.echevarriatravel.com
631-456-5394
reservations at echevarriatravel.com

For daily updates read our blog at
http://www.echevarriatravel.wordpress.com

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