Packaged travel 101

Just this week I saw my first motor coach whizzing by on the Parks Highway. The driver was most likely on a training run gearing up for the upcoming summer visitor season. It seems that year after year there are new tour companies including Alaska in their tour brochures. This arrangement doesn't happen all of the sudden -- packaging a tour takes a great deal of time, energy and forming partnerships that all take place years before the first motor coach of passengers ever hits the road.

To understand the elements of packaging a tour and how all the pieces fit together, you have to know the basic definition of the term "tour." As defined in the Essentials of Travel Packaging: Creating, Marketing and Managing the Travel Product, a tour is defined as "a prearranged, prepaid, journey to one or more destinations that generally returns to the point of origin, is usually arranged with an itinerary of leisure activities, and includes at least two travel elements."

Leisure activities could include flightseeing, a museum visit or rafting trip.

Examples of travel elements are transportation, lodging and meals. So to package a tour basically means taking all the components that make up a tour and wrap them together to create an attractive itinerary that can be presented to an individual or group.

There's a whole range of tour types spanning from individual to group to all-inclusive. The basic rule of thumb in determining the differences lies in the amount of customer effort that is involved.

The less customer effort the more inclusive the tour becomes. Also the less effort the customer puts forth the more professional planning and preparation is involved for the travel professional to deliver the service to their customers.

Regardless of the type of tour, planning and researching a destination must take place first.

There are two key industry players that work with tour operators to give them this needed information: Destination Marketing Organizations (DMOs) and suppliers of leisure activities and travel elements.

DMOs can be convention and visitors bureaus, chambers, or regional/state tourism office. In Alaska the Alaska Travel Industry Association would fulfill the state tourism DMO role and the Mat-Su CVB would be the DMO for the Valley.

Belonging to national tour associations and participating in business exchanges is vital to building relationships with tour operators. These exchanges are opportunities to sell the destination overall and explain the benefits of bringing visitors to the area. DMOs can also be regarded as "match makers" by introducing tour operators to suppliers who able to meet the needs of these operators.

Because tour itineraries are planned years in advance, relationships between DMOs, suppliers and operators must be viewed on a long-term basis.

The key to any successful relationship is good communication whether it is good or bad news. The same hold true for suppliers of tourism products and tour operators. Being able to communicate expectations will help ensure that everyone has a positive experience.

If you offer tour elements or leisure activities and would like to learn more about packaging travel, contact the Mat-Su Convention and Visitors Bureau. The bureau also offers a training course on customer service, call 746-5000 for more information.