US PRESIDENT Barack Obama got it in the neck recently from his country’s travel agents after he implied the profession was becoming obsolete.
The industry reacted furiously to Obama’s statement, during a town hall meeting in Illinois, that ‘One of the challenges in terms of rebuilding our economy is businesses have gotten so efficient that — when was the last time somebody went to a bank teller instead of using the ATM, or used a travel agent instead of just going online? A lot of jobs that used to be out there requiring people now have become automated’.
Not surprisingly the American Society of Travel Agents swiftly waded in to remind the president that US-based travel agencies have an annual payroll of $6.3 billion, employ more than 120,000 people, make upwards of $146 billion in travel sales annually, accounting for more than 50 per cent of all travel sold – including processing more than 50 per cent of all airline tickets, 79 per cent of tours and 78 per cent of all cruises – and help more than 144 million travellers get where they want to go each year.
Well that’s OK then, nothing for the travel agency business to worry about.
But hang on a minute, yes the figures are impressive but what about the other reports that tell us more and more travellers are indeed making use of new technology.
Airlines, for example, are making major investments in technology with the latest Airline IT Trends Survey by SITA and Airline Business revealing that up to 58 per cent of tickets are expected to be sold directly by 2014, 85 per cent of airlines either already sell or intend to sell tickets through mobile phones and 70 per cent either sell or plan to sell tickets through kiosks or social networks.
Hotel groups too are making frequent inroads into the technology field with companies such as Marriott introducing mobile booking apps, particularly useful for the traveller on the go, which offer the option to find and book a hotel worldwide, check reward points and access city guides all in one place.
Industry exhibitions such as World Travel Market in London and Arabian Travel Market in Dubai are definitely recognising the trend reporting that technology is easily their fastest growing section.
And certainly, here at TTN, every month we receive news of dozens of companies putting the latest technology to use whether it be to promote bookings through their own online portals or offering better services with solutions for checking and changing bookings, accessing options such as city tours and restaurant reservations or even signing up for travel risk management information.
When you look at it that way, it seems the prez might just have a point – but only up to a point.
After all you only have to look at the UK high street where, for a few years, the standing joke was that all the local banks had been turned into bars. In fact in my home town we even had a hostelry called the Banker’s Draft – a clever play on words but a pretty useless pub in case you’re interested – which was all very well until people cottoned on to the fact that ATM machines and call centres can’t deal with real problems, they can’t offer financial advice or give you a stern telling off when you go overdrawn (well the call centre did try but that’s the beauty of the disconnect button).
Such was the backlash from the everyday banking public that one major financial concern actually ran a television advertising campaign explaining that it was, shock horror, going back to the high street and turning the bars back into banks.
Of course people still use the ATM machines, but the banks had found it was the specialised services people really missed and there’s perhaps a lesson there for the travel agency industry.
Agents have to become true specialists and fortunately there is help out there with lots of countries’ tourism ministries offering familiarisation trips and training for them to become destination experts.
The range of travel experiences is also growing rapidly, with holiday makers as likely to seek a voluntourism break with elephants in Kenya as two weeks on the beach in Cyprus, meaning good, knowledgeable, accurate advice is at a premium.
It’s no longer enough just to book a customer’s trip, agents need to be able to put together the best possible package, not just in terms of cost but also experience, and offer up-to-date and truly personal travel and destination advice – after all that’s the one thing you can’t get online.
So is the industry challenged? Definitely. But obsolute? I don’t think so.