Just Picture It Now

On November 8th, YTB booked more than 12,000 cruise passengers through gift certificates, individual, and group cruises. Some of the questions that have come up over the last few days include:

• What kind of dollar value does this consist of?
• What was the average amount per cruise?
• How many gift certificates, individual, and group cruises were sold?
• How many were booked directly off sites as opposed to calling in?
• How many cruises were sold by one cruise line prior to YTB's One Day Sale with Carnival?
• Why did it take almost a month to release the numbers?

In my prior post I eluded to Liberty Travel and their efforts in CLIA's World's Largest Cruise Night booking more than 1000 cruises with 200 store fronts across the country. While it's not known exactly how many "Agents" actually work with Liberty Travel, it's my understanding that each store consists of 8-20 Agents per storefront.

Here is what's so interesting to me. Not only doesn't anyone hash over this statement the way they have about YTB, it's not even brought into question. Granted, I understand that Liberty Travel is not only a well respected Agency, but it's been doing business since 1951. A company with this type of time and stature in the industry doesn't have to prove itself like YTB does. I'm simply pointing out how two companies can release almost exactly the same information, (or lack there of) and how each company is viewed. One gets a complete pass, or is considered irrelevant, while the other creates so many questions and is looked at under intense scrutiny and criticism.

Here are a couple of points we need to take into consideration when looking at this One Day Sale. I suppose that some may consider these points nothing more than excuses, and I'm not trying to justify either way, or state that I believe these points are either right or wrong. It is what it is.

• A sale of this magnitude has never been done by one company before.
• This sale was put together and executed in about a three week period.
• Carnival does not report "dollar volume" but by "cruise passengers".
• Various methods were used to make these sales including gift certificates, YTB web sites, and direct with Carnival.
• While YTB will implement SAP NetWeaver® technology platform to process and gather information of this type in the future, it will not be implemented until March of 2008.
• Any monetary sales numbers at this point would be merely an estimate due to both upgrades of gift certificates, or cancellation of bookings.

I'm currently working on a project right now that will help clarify some "averages" in regards to some of the questions concerning what YTB sells in cruises. It's my hope that this project will answer some of the questions concerning an "average" YTB client compared to our Traditional Agents. However, it's a fairly large project that is taking considerable time in putting together. It's the best representation and documentation I can think of when relating to numbers and sales volume.

Again, this may take some time, and my first priority is to my team and my business. It's my hope that it won't take weeks to complete, but I have other more pressing matters to contend with currently. The most immediate being the fact that the #7 jersey is on, the meat is on the grill, chips are sitting by my side, and the face is shaved and prepared for a large Steelers logo in each side of the face in preparation for a 4:15 matchup between the Pittsburgh Steelers and the New England Patriots.

Priorities my friends...priorities.

Subscribe to Just Picture It Now for additional announcements and details!

Doug & Ronda Bauknight
AKA: TravelPro
Travel Agent / Networker
Phone: 678.458.5812

Learn How To Become A Travel Agent

Book Your Travel & Vacations With

Travel Reservations: 1.800.243.4450
RTA #24635