Luxury Travel Advisor - August 2008 - (Page 6)

EDITOR'S LETTER A Calming Effect W The ability to remain calm in a seemingly turbulent situation is a great trait to have. hen a journalist’s tape recorder goes on the fritz, everything changes. Your breathing becomes halted and all that was good just a moment ago feels like a mockery in what has become a cruel, cruel world. That’s at least how I felt when I called Jim Strong on the morning of our interview, which would serve as the basis for the cover story in this issue (see page 60). “I’m running late, Jim, I’m trying to figure out what’s wrong with my tape recorder,” I told him. “Don’t worry, Ruthanne, we’ll just bring you over to the Office Depot across from our office and get you a new one,” he said, without missing a beat, in the calmest voice I’d ever heard. My muddled brain began to clear. There was a solution to this terrible problem. I wasn’t going to die. I felt like singing—dancing even. As I hung up the phone, I took another look at the tape recorder and realized the hold button was on, a fabulous explanation for why it kept shutting off as soon as I turned it on. Exhale. I’m telling you all of this because the experience, for at least a moment, put me in the position of knowing what it felt like to be one of Jim Strong’s clients, of what it was like to call him with a scenario that seemed all but hopeless and to hear him break through all of the emotional clutter and respond with a grounded, logical solution. Now I knew what it was like to be that client to whom he delivered a new BlackBerry in Venice, after she’d dropped hers in the Grand Canal. I could put myself in the place of the photographer whose film he arranged to be retrieved from South Africa after he’d flown out of the country in a rush after September 11. After several years of writing about the top luxury travel advisors in the industry, I’ve never considered the fact that the ability to remain calm in a seemingly turbulent situation is a great trait to have. It certainly complements the ability to reserve a top suite for your client even when the hotel is all booked up, or to create the ideal customized itinerary that includes reservations at the top tables in a city’s best restaurants, as well as insider shopping tips in markets that only the locals know about. The thing is, both Jim and his mother, Nancy, can do all those things as well. When I visited with them in their Dallas offices and heard about the scope of the services they provide to their ultrawealthy clientele, I realized that they don’t just provide unique and detailed itineraries for their clients, they serve as lifestyle agents too. Anyone who has read The Wall Street Journal article on Nancy Strong knows that she’ll have clients over to her home who happen to be going on the same cruise so that they’ll be dear friends when they finally hit the high seas together. In fact, Nancy treats all of her clients as if they are visitors in her home, ensuring that they are incredibly comfortable during their interactions with her. What I also learned during my trip to Dallas is that Jim and Nancy Strong have passed along their top talents to a very skilled staff who also cater to very elite clientele. This is a group of people who know each other well, for the Strongs make sure that their agents see the world so that they’ll be able to enhance their selling techniques when they return home. Speaking of passing along top talents, Virtuoso is launching a program that will teach its younger member agents how to sell more effectively. It’s doing that by using a matrix that captures the best characteristics of its senior members (see page 70). By creating such a program, Virtuoso is addressing the dire need to bring fresh talent into the industry and retain it. If travel agency owners and managers have a specific curriculum that they can assign to their agents, the odds are that these agents will stick around, especially as their selling skills improve and they begin to earn a salary that is worthy of anyone who is a bona fide consultant to the affluent. RUTHANNE TERRERO, CTC Editorial Director rterrero@questex.com 6 LUXURY TRAVEL ADVISOR | August 2008

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of Luxury Travel Advisor - August 2008

Luxury Travel Advisor - August 2008 Contents Publisher's Letter Editor's Letter Maui Dubai Cape Town The Capella Resort and Spa, at Pedregal Cabo San Lucas Ritz-Carlton Cancun Presidential Suites The Palazzo, Las Vegas The Water Club Arrabelle at Vail Square Ferntree The Spa at Half Moon Fall Foliage Cruises New England Strong Travel On the Horizon: Luxury Travel Expo The Pulse Traveling Shopper Leaders Speak Sightings Source List

Luxury Travel Advisor - August 2008

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