A little bit of Winter Sun
Having spent the last few months pontificating about holidays, I find myself wondering as I seem to every month about the quality of what’s on offer and the ability of those in the ‘know’ to deliver something that is suitable for their clients.
Yesterday, amongst doing several other things, which were far more successful, like the redesign of the blog, which I hope all regular readers will like, I went to the travel agent, something I have never done before, in the hope of at least getting some good advice about a holiday. I’m always a little suspicious of travel agents, because I’m not your typical tourist or holiday maker. I’ve spent a considerable amount of time traveling around without the back up of bags of cash, and I like the real, in all the meanings of the word, of people and places. Put simply that probably equates to a travel agents idea of a night mare customer, someone who is not just going to by a package holiday with a pool, bar and nightlife, which may be a miss conception of that type of holiday on my part, and if so I appologise, but I hope you catch my drift.
Anyway, what actually happened was the agent talked specifically to my partner, who was asking all the questions, while I sat at the desk making excuses for why I disliked this or the timing was wrong, or that place wasn’t warm enough. Give the agent her due, she was fairly helpful and tried to be pleasant, but of course we are traveling in prime time, due to the Easter holidays, and things would be expensive and plane seats would be in demand….. A holiday to the canaries, for the price of a holiday to the Caribbean
What is it that a customer service person and I’m talking here about any one in a customer facing role, weather that be a gym instructor, a bank manager, a super market till operator or a train ticket conductor, what is it that they actually sell? Is it a ticket or a mortgage, or is it themselves? Part of me thinks that one of the reasons that I didn’t get enthused about any of the offers the travel agent put on the table, was because I didn’t believe that she really felt anything about any of the places she was discussing, and I knew that as far as holidays go we would have extremely different tastes. If I had gone to buy a shirt from, Cult Clothing for example, or more locally from one of the small independents like Front Room, I would have received an honest opinion from the staff there about what would suit me, not what would suit them. This is part of their service and also part of their success. I value their opinion, even though their personal tastes are probably different, I appreciate as do they that I am the buyer and they are the facilitator.
Holidays are a very individual buy, and therefore perhaps require a very individual sell and good facilitation. Car sales men perhaps have the edge on this, working hard to give the customer specifically what they want, perhaps some times edging on the verge of what they perceive customers might want, but still holding the ball park for facilitating sales. I wonder sometimes when I’m doing my rounds and visiting towns and I see shops closing down, and prime retail locations with empty premises, whether the reason they are no longer in existence was because they had forgotten how to, or perhaps never perceived that us shoppers are fickle, and need to be coaxed out of our money. I still need a holiday, I’m still a potential buyer, but am I really looking for a specific package, or just someone with the ability to sell me one.
