Travel Niches: Babymooners
by John Hawks

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Want to tap into this lucrative market by acting as the official travel agent for your alma mater (or for the public and private campuses in your area)? Keep these ideas in mind:

Pick your target schools wisely. If you're a home-based agent in Colorado, there's honestly little chance that you can go out tomorrow and sign up the University of Colorado as a new client. In fact, most well-known private institutions and the flagship state universities already work with major tour operators that offer basic, low-priced "lead in" trips built around basic sightseeing components. And, in many cases, they also offer upscale tours and cruises at high price points.

Your best bet in the beginning is selecting one or two local colleges -- for example, the regional affiliate of your state university network, or the nearest private colleges -- as your initial prospects. Start with basic research (e.g., the number of alumni, any well-known faculty members around whom you can build a tour, and the school's existing travel programs, if any). Then, talk with (or meet with) your sales reps or district sales managers with your preferred suppliers; in many cases, they will help you develop collateral marketing materials to present to the school and even accompany you to the initial meeting. The last step? Approach the school's alumni office, and set up a meeting!

Be ready to offer the full range of travel products: escorted tours, cruises, and independent (FIT) trips. That diversity may set you apart if the school has only offered cruises in the past, for example.

Decide in advance your limit on splitting commissions with the school. As an independent business owner, you must decide how much (if any) commission you're willing to share with the college alumni office. However, it's best that you know that upper limit before you walk in and sit down with the alumni director. Don't commit on the spot; instead, ask the alumni director to share the figures he or she had in mind, and go home and run the numbers to see if you can make a profit on your share of the suppliers' pay.

Get ready to work hard on marketing. Sure, the school will use its available resources -- alumni magazines and newsletters, alumni events, email lists, etc. -- to promote the trips. In most cases, however, the school will depend on you to write the copy and brainstorm other marketing ideas to sell the trips. (Here's another competitive advantage you may have as a travel agent: You can bring in your preferred suppliers to dream up cooperative marketing programs and share the costs!)

Tout your consumer protection and "E&O" coverage. If the school is currently producing its own trips, you have another competitive strength to promote: the ways you protect travelers from risks. For example, you can explain how your professional liability/errors and omissions insurance will protect the school if something goes awry, and you can describe why the travel insurance you sell to travelers is superior to any product currently sold by the school for its trips.

Show the school how you can sell into retail departures. One open secret in the college travel sector is that many schools rarely fill a group on their own. If you can demonstrate how the school's travel program can be built (in part or in whole) around cruises and off-the-shelf group tours that will run whether the school sells two or 200 passengers, you may save the college a lot of headaches down the road. (Nothing's worse for the university's image than telling alumni who've already bought nonrefundable airline tickets that their trip won't operate because too few people signed up!)

Find "champions" in the alumni program who can help sell individual trips. Whether it's the alumni director, or the faculty member who's escorting a trip, or a well-known alumnus/alumnae who can shake the trees by contacting fellow alumni, your chances of success with alumni travel increase dramatically if you can identify key people to drive reservations for you.