Friend Therapy: Vacationing with your BFF

 

What is friend therapy? If you have to ask, YOU NEED A VACATION!   

Friend trips are often laid back, low pressure, no-stress trips.  We all love our families, but as mom or dad, we find our selves having to be boss, driver, financier, decision maker and ringleader of a 3 ring circus.  Days of working, evening of running to sports and recitals followed by meal prep, homework, chores..it adds up.  Sometimes you just need to spend a few days away to recharge.

Pick your bestie, your sister or brother, your lunch buddy from work, and get away.   Explore a new town that's halfway between where you each live, take a cruise, hit Vegas and enjoy some night life, visit a new country, relax at the beach.  

Schedule a call with your travel agent to talk about your time and budget - if you're feeling really adventuresome, let your travel agent surprise you. 

Setting the Pace

Setting the pace for a family vacation can be difficult, especially when your family is a mix of go-go-go, chill-by-pool, and I-can't-people-today.    That's my family.  We all enjoy trips, and of course, we all compromise, but ultimately each person needs to have time to do their thing.  

As a mom, I have learned over the years to identify the signs of who needs downtime, who needs alone time, and when everyone is ready to jump all into a day full of activities.

As a travel agent, I talk with my clients before anything else happens. Its important to get the feel for the people going on their trip, and sometimes they don't even know themselves.  A conversation helps bring things to light - like is your family on the go all the time, heavy into sports and dance? Or do you tend to spend weekends on a hike? Or geocaching in a new city?  

Plan your vacation days to give downtime to the people who need it, but maybe plan some alternate activities for the "go-go" members who will be frustrated at sitting around.  The trick is to balance this with making sure that the people needing down time are not feeling left out. As an example, on a recent trip, our daughter needed some downtime, so she enjoyed some alone time in our suite, while my husband and I headed out to the pool for a little while.  We all felt like we were enjoying our time, and no one felt left out. 

Having an amusement park day adds an extra level of complication to this process.  Families tend to push the energy level to the max, feeling like they want the most park time for their dollar. But if you're paying for a resort while you're at the park, make the most of your hotel dollar as well and take a mid day break. If you're only at a park for the day, enjoy a shady seat, ice cream, and a show, or  if your kids are little, find a parents room where you can cool off with your little ones and even let them nap.

Setting the right pace for your group can make or break a vacation.  Talk to your travel agent about your family's energy level and vacation style at the start of your planning and be confident that your next trip will be great!

Why buy the cow when you can get the milk for free?

 This is kind of a weird phrase, I know.  And to be blunt, it was something my mother said to me related to guys. (get it?)  But the concept comes up in conversations among travel professionals a lot.  

Travel professionals spend a lot of time, effort, and money to learn their trade.  Time researching, taking classes, reading blogs and marketing information, industry updates and following news.  Money to visit and learn about different destinations (not vacations, but think 3 days of visiting 10-13 hotels to understand their offerings, properties, clientele, etc.).  Effort to put together customized itineraries for clients, to market themselves and their offerings, etc. 

Most travel professionals work on commission paid directly from the locations the book - hotels, resorts, cruise lines, etc.  Many places, like small mom & pop properties, boutique hotels, etc. don't pay any commission at all, but people like them, so agents will them.  Since 2022, more and more agencies charge a  planning fee to help offset the amount of time they spend planning custom trips.  Most agents won't start any work for a client until the fee is paid -- see, that's giving away the milk for free.  

Some people don't understand this, and think nothing of asking someone they know in the travel industry questions like "what's the best place to stay in Costa Rica" or "which cruise line is better for Alaska?" or even "how much is it for a 5 night stay at Disney for my family of 4?".  The true first answer to all of those questions "it depends". None of those questions at face value provide enough information to be accurately answered. Which is why travel agents dislike travel questions "from a friend" as much as a lawyer hates when someone asks "is this legal...?" at a cocktail party, or a plumber hates when his neighbor asks for a 'favor' that involves replacing their faucet.  

I confess that sometimes I do give away a taste of the milk so that people know how good it is.  I don't answer all of their questions, but I might answer one or two in a generalized fashion, or I'll show them an itinerary I've built for someone else, or I'll send them a rough draft.  I charge a planning fee before I do any solid research (and it's a rare trip that I don't spend time researching, even if its something I've booked dozens of times), and I do charge a cancellation fee if I've put together an entire itinerary that is cancelled after it's all booked. I have to - if you knew how much money I lost in cancelled bookings during the COVID pandemic, and how many hours I worked for nothing, you'd never question the fee.  I love what I do, but I have bills to pay just like everyone else.  

If the bottom line is all that matters to you, and your time costs you nothing, then maybe you won't work with a travel agent. But if you want to enjoy a vacation that has been thoughtfully curated for you based on your travel preferences, group interests and your budget, make the call, pay the fee, work with a travel agent. You'll be glad you did!

Why Use a Travel Agent?

What is the benefit of using a travel agent? (2023 Update)

That is the question everyone asks.  Years ago, having planned a few Disney trips myself, I asked it too.  I had planned two trips for our family, using the Disney web site, organized my days, figured out my dining, called Disney's reservations, scoured the web sites to find out about tips, discount codes, crowds, the works.  But when my husband and I were discussing our next trip, I was pretty busy at work, with Girl Scouts, and with my daughter's sports and activities. I didn't have a lot of time to dig around and wait on hold for dining reservations.  So I decided to use a travel agent.


So EASY! 

I filled out a form online with information about our travel dates and preferences, and when the agent contacted me, we chatted more about what we expected from our vacation, what we liked and didn't like to do, and how this was a special birthday trip.  She priced out the trip for me, and offered me an alternative plan as well.  She was the one who waited on hold to make my dining reservations, book the tour we wanted to do,   When free dining came out, she let me know about it, and how it would effect our trip. When I got a special discount code in the mail, I sent it to her and she figured out which was the better deal for me - free dining or discount code.  It was so easy - it was then that I understood the true value of using a travel agent.

When we planned our next trip, I contacted her right away.  Let her know the  time frame for our trip and away we went! When I asked about military pricing for friends, she was able to give me all the details. When we discussed special things to do (anniversary trip) she gave me a few options that would fit our likes.  We booked the Wild Africa Trek and loved doing it.

So, what's the benefit of using a travel agent?

• Saving you time
• Finding tips you may not have otherwise known
• Letting someone else make those early morning phone calls or long hold times for hard to get reservations
• Enjoying a vacation planned with your likes, preferences, travel style all in mind without having to do it all yourself, but knowing that you have total control over the entire process
• Having someone monitor changes and new programs released after your trip is confirmed
• Having an "in" to industry news -- I receive emails daily with programs, special activities, discounts, etc, being released in the travel industry. 

I'm skipping forward now to March of 2020. You know what I'm talking about.  The world slowly shut down as country after country showed high case numbers of the contagious COVID-20.  I had been a travel agent for about six years by this time.  I had people who had just returned from vacation as airlines shut down, I had people traveling in Mexico and the Caribbean AS airlines were halting flights, I had people with wedding planned, huge multi generation vacations to Disney and Europe and more. The rug was pulled out from everyone.

The travel industry, myself included, spent countless hours working (for free!) helping people re-route their trips, find places to stay if they couldn't leave their destination, shift vacations that had taken months to plan and now needed to be re-planned. We, as an industry, took calls at all hours depending on our clients' time zones. We spent hours and hours on hold with airlines and supplies, we negotiated with travel insurance companies to ensure that our clients' funds were not lost.  Did I mention that much of this was free? why? because before 2020, many agencies did not charge a planning fee, and only got paid after the client traveled.  So we doubled our time working to plan, cancel, and re-plan a vacation -- only to have it cancelled again as the pandemic wore on.  People who didn't use a travel agent? You guessed it - they spend all that time themselves, usually with great frustration of not having any inside contacts or resources, and many people lost money in the process. 

I hope you'll consider using my services as a travel agent - I will enjoy getting to know you and your family, and you will have the confidence of knowing that your trip will be focused on you and having as much fun and relaxation time as you like.I have worked with VacationKids.com since 2014 - we are looking to add a new URL to our brand reminding people that we can plan any sort of vacation - family, couples, adult friends, multi generational, class reunions - the works!