It has been an interesting week with some unique stories I’m excited to share with you! One of the things I wondered when I committed to writing a weekly blog was, “Am I really going to have something worth writing about every week?” This week answered that question for me. It reminded me why I love what I do, and it reminded me that sometimes the biggest value I provide isn’t something a client ever expected.
A couple came to me late last week after working with another travel agent. They were kind about the individual, but honest. They told me they hadn’t really seen the value. They felt like they could have just booked the trip themselves. They told me something I’ve said before. “We’re probably going to pay the same price whether we book directly or through a travel advisor, so we figured we’d rather support a small business than a big corporation.” (Thank goodness for people like that.) I appreciated their honesty because I think it’s a question worth asking. What should a travel advisor do for you?
As we talked through their plans, they shared that they wanted to book an amazing 68-day world cruise on Princess Cruises from Los Angeles to Hawaii, Fiji, Australia, New Zealand and more before heading up to Asia where they will disembark in Singapore. They had already narrowed their cabin choice to an oceanview stateroom, or perhaps a balcony, but felt more comfortable with the pricing of the oceanview. On the surface, it looked like a perfectly reasonable choice. Then I pulled up the cabin inventory available to travel advisors. The cabin they were considering was an oceanview cabin and technically had a window. It also had a lifeboat sitting directly outside that window. Can you imagine spending more than two months sailing around the world only to look out at the side of a lifeboat every morning?
Fortunately, there was still one balcony cabin available in the next category they were considering. We grabbed it before someone else did, and immediately afterwards the sailing showed as sold out. I kept thinking about that conversation through the weekend. Not because we found the last balcony cabin (though I’m so thankful we did), but because it reminded me that so much of what I do isn’t about booking travel. It’s about helping people see the things they didn’t even know to look for.
Kendie smiling as she thinks about travel planning
The same thing happened today in a completely different way. A client messaged me about traveling on their upcoming Holland America Alaska cruise with a refrigerated injectable medication. They were sure we’d chatted about their cabin having a refrigerator, so were just interested in how to fly with the medication. While I guided them to the practice of bringing a cooler with a frozen ice pack containing their labeled prescription medication, it was also an opportunity to explain that what we think of a fridge on a cruise is often little more than a cooler itself and is not reliable for storing refrigerated medications like your insulin or GLP-1. Instead, I pointed out the Guest Accessibility area of Holland America where we could request a medication cooler for their cabin, if available, or access to the Medical Center’s refrigeration unit to store the medication. And I had one more question for them. “Is the medication injectable?” Once confirmed, I was also able to request a sharps container for their stateroom before they even boarded. It’s a tiny detail…unless you’re the traveler.
These conversations reminded me that sometimes life unfolds one conversation at a time, and sometimes travel planning does too. Whether I’ve been helping someone decide between Hawaii and Mexico for a family Christmas, planning a Costa Rica adventure with waterfalls and ziplining, or putting together a once-in-a-lifetime journey through Southeast Asia after a world cruise, every trip starts with questions, some of which you may not have even known to ask.
That’s really what travel planning is. It’s not just finding flights or comparing hotels. It’s asking questions you didn’t even know needed to be asked. Sometimes those questions save you from staring at a lifeboat for 68 days. Sometimes they make sure your medication is safely stored before you even leave home. And sometimes they’re the questions that help uncover a trip you didn’t even know was possible.
If you’ve been dreaming about getting away, let’s have a conversation. Sometimes all it takes is one question to uncover an adventure you never saw coming.
