Rebecca and I leave for New York in 4 more days. I'm beginning to get excited. Although I have spent a lot of time visiting New York there is always something to see that you haven't seen before. Also, it'll be nice just to get away from the daily grind for a few days. I know.... Daily grind, you say? Even planning trips has it's down side. Sometimes airlines cancel flights after they are booked. Other times clients change their plans or perhaps plans are changed by some issue outside their control. Either way, it's pretty easy to call the travel agent and just say, the flight/hotel/tour that was planned for that day needs to be changed.
People, the fun part of being a travel agent is not in the changing of plans, it is in the making of plans. I know what you're thinking. But Susan, you always say to schedule the trip early to get the best possible price.... we can always make changes once it is booked. I do say that and I mean it. But I secretly hope that you will be so pleased with the trip that we have put together that you don't want to change a thing. I know in the back of my mind that this probably won't be the case, but a girl can dream.
So, anyway in addition to my own personal trip this week to New York and Boston, I have a lot of clients scheduled to travel in the coming months. Lots of little adjustments are being made to their trips now. I'm busily running numbers every week in hopes of saving a client a few dollars on the trips that we already booked. Of course there are new trips to plan for people who have contacted me. In addition, I'm trying to pull trips regularly and post them in various locations either sending emails to people who may have expressed an interest in the past, writing blogs about them, or posting on Facebook and Twitter in an attempt to get some people interested in traveling to a place they haven't previously thought of. I try to write this blog somewhat regularly. You might be surprised at the amount of time I spend on it. Even with all the grammatical errors and the haphazard way in which it is written, it takes time. On top of that, I have regular weekly networking opportunities that I attend, and a girl has to get a pedicure!
When I first began this business, there was a lot of down time. If someone called or emailed asking me for pricing on a trip, I could take a day or two to pull everything I could possibly find. Plus at that time while I was still learning the different suppliers systems, it took that long. There was plenty of time for baking, piddling around the house, running for a pedicure and meeting up with friends at lunch or dinner. Not so much anymore. There were days even in the beginning when I worked until 7 or 8 in the evening. But now, it is becoming the norm. I'm not complaining. I'm actually kind of excited. It means, I'm getting busy and busy is good when you are getting a business started. I'm trying to plan to meet a friend for lunch or dinner this week and now I'm wondering how I'll get away for that long. That's a very good thing.
So, I guess I'll shut this blog down for today and get busy working on rescheduling a canceled flight to Orlando. Have a great Monday! Don't expect to hear from me too much this week it's going to be busy!
No comments:
Post a Comment