Start A Global Travel Agency Business From Home Pt 1

Becoming a Home-Based Travel Agent, Part 1:
The "Traditional" Travel Agency
Copyright © Kelly Monaghan, http://www.HomeTravelAgency.com

The twentieth century saw the rise of the travel agent.
Middlemen (which is what travel agents are, in effect) became
necessary for a number of reasons. Travel is a very complex
product -- a whole series of products, in effect. In the
early days, at least, the companies that provided the
products were far more adept at providing than at selling.
Their customers were also very widely distributed
geographically. These and other factors created an
opportunity for entrepreneurs who agreed to represent the
products of many different travel suppliers to a local market
in exchange for a commission on the sale. That commission was
traditionally ten percent, although as in all selling
situations top producers were rewarded with higher
commissions, called "overrides" in the travel business.

The system of distributing travel products through a network
of travel agencies took hold and travel agencies themselves
came to look very much alike, sharing a great many common
features. They were storefront, retail businesses, located in
commercial districts of town, open during normal retail
business hours. In short, they were very much like the
clothing shops, boutiques, grocery stores, bookstores, and
other retailers with whom they shared the block. This picture
is what I call the "traditional" travel agency.

The traditional travel agency looks the way it does for many
reasons, but several concern us here. Mostly they have to do
with the airlines.

Airline tickets are written (or printed, now) on blank paper
called "ticket stock." In its blank form this paper is like a
blank, but valid, check. Anyone who has it can write a ticket
to anywhere for any value. Hence the term, "write your own
ticket." Ticket stock is extremely valuable and since it is
entrusted to travel agencies the airlines had a very valid
reason to ensure that their ticket stock was safe. So they
developed a set of rules that would tend to ensure that they
could trust the travel agents who were selling their tickets.

These rules included things like:

A business location in a commercial district. In other words,
the travel agency had to look and act like a "store."

A system of bonding, to assure the airline that the travel
agency owner was solvent and respectable and, therefore, not
likely to be tempted to do anything fishy with the airline's
precious ticket stock.

Another factor determining the look and feel of the
traditional travel agency is the computer. Travel agencies
were one of the first businesses to be extensively
computerized. The complex and expensive computerized
reservations systems (CRS) that made ticketing easy
encouraged even more centralization and "professionalism" in
the travel agent industry.

In other words, if you wanted to be a travel agent you had to
open a storefront agency with its high overhead and complex
computer systems. This took a lot of money. Of course, you
could also get trained to operate a CRS and go to work in a
storefront agency, and many agency owners started out just
this way.

This pattern, in turn, created another distinguishing
characteristic of the traditional travel agency: it was a
place to which would-be travelers came to talk to agents
sitting at a desk operating a CRS. Most travel agents became
"order takers." Of course, there were always exceptions to
this general rule. Many travel agencies employed "outside
agents" to hustle up business. These outside agents were, in
effect, free ranging inside agents who returned to the agency
and their CRSs to generate the airline tickets and other
bookings they had made outside. Some agencies used "bird
dogs" as they are called, people who sent customers into the
agency location where inside agents would cater to their
needs. Bird dogs performed a valuable service and were
compensated with a small percentage of any commissions that
resulted from their referrals. This was very much akin to the
"finder's fees" paid in other industries. Nonetheless, these
were exceptions that proved the rule: most travel agents were
reactive order takers tied to their desks and the CRSs that
sat on them.

All this began to change in the 90s thanks to a number of
interrelated trends, which we will discuss in the next
lesson.
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This mini-course on becoming a home-based travel agent is
brought to you by the Home-Based Travel Agent Resource Center
and The Intrepid Traveler, publisher of a comprehensive home
study course for home-based travel agents.

For more information, visit:
http://www.HomeTravelAgency.com