Custom Travel To France

My colleague Beth Reid and myself attended the French Affairs convention near Chicago from October 26 to October 28, for the annual meeting that unites French suppliers and US tour operators that sell France as a destination.

The convention was organized by the French Government Tourist Office (aka Maison de la France) and hosted at the very nice Westin hotel in Lombard, IL.

The goal was to brief everyone on this past year’s statistics on travel to France, as well as previsions for the coming year. Despite tough times, spirits were up, and a lot of people showed up for these exciting 2 days.

The award ceremony that took place on Sunday night rewarded several tour operators for their achievements such as “Best Extensive Offer”, “Best Brochure”, or “Best Special Interest”.

Just like last year, some 115 tour operators were present, and our little company was nominated for “Best Website”, up against Air France Holidays, amongst others. This time, we were awarded the prize, and called up on stage. We were absolutely thrilled, not to mention surprised!

It is quite  an honor to receive such a recognition from such a big organization like Maison de la France. Check out our award-winning website and let us know your comments: http://www.BellaTerraTravel.com.

Beth (right) and I (left, and 5 months pregnant!) accepting the Best Website award from Irene Lai from Air France.

France is the most visited country in the world. Despite the reputation of its grumpy people, the hexagon-shaped country just keeps on hitting the highest score every year of the most visitors. However, its opponents, Spain and Italy, seem to be slowly making their way up and getting closer and closer each round.

The people at the French Ministry of Tourism, well aware of the situation, are definitely spending the big bucks to educate the nation on how to greet and treat tourists. Heck, to start with, we have a whole ministry dedicated to this, who even oversees branches in most countries to promote this wonderful land.

The government ensures continuous training of its travel industry soldiers by encouraging them to properly greet the visitors, like the campaign “Bonjour!” that was launched in 1994, and recently refreshed by the campaign “Bienvenue en France”, widely marketed to all concerned.

Another useful aspect of the ministry is to run surveys on traveling habits and attitudes of the foreign visitors. This is how I came to know that 36% of the entourage of American travelers speak negatively to them about France. 16% would not recommend the destination AT ALL.

Wow.

Ok. So I’ll admit it: we the French have a centuries-old tradition of complaining. Yes, we like to complain about the weather (it’s always too hot or too cold anyway), and we like our strikes. The people strike to complain, and the ones who don’t, complain about the ones who do. We are very much attached to our quality of life and our 35-hour work week, and seem to have no intention of compromising it, even if it means we will be the laughing stock of the rest of the world forever.

Once in a while, I have a surprised client who comes back from France feeling cheated of an experience for not having encountered a smelly taxi driver yelling at them in French. It’s as if the French were saving their social skills for special occasions, or for people who they ascertain are worth it. But I know for a fact that if you dig a little deeper, most of us not taxi drivers can actually be nice and funny and capable of leaving those dreary faces behind.

But has the French gone too far into maintaining their high standard of Complainers? With the Euro climbing through the roof these days, it seems that missing your hotel reservation because the railroad workers are on strike, or being snubbed by the crêpes vendor because you forgot to say “s’il vous plaît” , is just not cute anymore. Because traveling to Europe is more expensive than anywhere else right now, travelers are expecting courtesy, and they want their trip to run smoothly. They just want a nice time for their money’s worth. AND THEY SHOULD!

Which is exactly why the Italian and the Spanish are gaining points. Being naturally warmer people than the French, they are using their Latin charm to lure the tourists over to their borders.

So why on earth are 78 million people still packing their suitcases to happily go get bullied by rude Parisians? I personally can think of a million and one reasons, and here are a few of them:

• BECAUSE you enjoy getting a fresh baguette first thing in the morning and listen to the boulanger complain about the weather.
• BECAUSE a 5-course meal is not just reserved for Sundays.
• BECAUSE you like a good Pastis and a game of Belote with a bunch of strangers.
• BECAUSE each region is so culturally different that you will never be bored.
• BECAUSE visiting a prehistoric cave and a 12th century fortress can be done in the same day.
• BECAUSE you don’t have to choose between sea and mountain.
• BECAUSE most French cheeses are exclusively produced in their own regions so you won’t find them anywhere else.

And finally…

• BECAUSE where else are you going to participate in a French Kiss World Record event on Valentine’s Day? http://www.parisianevents.com/parisianparty/?p=565

Yes, for these charming reasons and many, many more, France is still sitting up high on its throne. Despite their quirks and eccentricities, the French can be lovable. Really.

By Celia Coene, BellaTerra Travel.

Last month, we participated in a seminar organized by the French Government’s Maison de la France in San Francisco. It attracted some 130 travel agents from the Bay Area who were there to learn more on how to sell France, to make contacts and have a drink. The whole BellaTerra family showed up: Beth, John, Laurent and myself.

Different kinds of associations and companies were represented amongst the stands. Several American tour operators had a table, such as RailEurope and European Tours. Some Regional Tourist Offices also made the trip all the way from France to proudly advertise their French region. I got to chat with my friend Penelope Vinter, the Sales Manager representing the Burgundy region, who helps me negotiate new contracts within this beautiful area soon-to-be featured on our site.

It was the opportunity for me to not only meet a bunch of travel agents ecstatic about our products, I also discovered new boutique Parisians hotels that I believe our clientèle will love, such as Le Chat Noir, a brand new design hotel located near the Moulin Rouge cabaret.

It was an exciting opportunity for us, and I must proudly say, a huge success. Our table was crowded the whole time, we distributed all our brochures and goodies and got a wonderful payback after that. It’s not easy trying to get our name out there, but the word is definitely out and despite the Euro not being on our side, we are growing healthier and stronger every day, and building wonderful, and hopefully lasting relationships with dedicated travel agents.

As I sit here in the Boston Logan airport at 7 in the morning, I am trying to grasp the amazing 2 days it has been for BellaTerra.

I was attending the French Affairs conference in Cambridge, MA, organized by Maison de la France which, for those who don’t know, is the company ran by the French Minister of Tourism in charge of promoting France as a desination worldwide, kind of like an humongous tourist office. (see their website)

The conference’s goal was to enable American Tour Operators and French incoming services to meet and do business. A big gala dinner was planned as well as an award ceremony, rewarding tour operators for their diverse skills and accomplishments.

All the big ones were there: Air France Holidays, Tauck tours, Trafalgar, Travel Impressions, and many, many more. A total of about 400 were represented, and me, proudly representing BellaTerra Travel, which let’s face it didn’t ring that much of a bell to a lot of people. Maybe you can see what I am getting at by now, but imagine my surprise when the speaker announced the 4 nominees of the Best Website Award and pronounced the name of my beloved little company amongst 3 giant ones!

Ok, you had to be there to get the feeling. But seeing BellaTerra Travel written on a giant screen in front of hundreds of formally dressed competitors was the most amazing feeling of accomplishment, and not to mention astonishment. By the time they announced the winner, Air France Holidays, I had already been shipped on a one-way ticket to cloud 9 and no way that not getting the prize was going to get me down from up there. I was so proud that our baby (yes, still talking about BT) along with 3 years of really hard work had been recognized by such a prestigious organization as Maison de la France.

It was an awesome evening. I felt asleep that night with a big smile on my face and my heart filled with pride, not knowing that the next day was going to be a continuation of all that good stuff…

The second day of the conference started with an interesting discussion group about demographics analysis and travel behavior of the baby boomers. That was followed by a nice lunch and a trade show allowing us to talk one on one with the French Providers.

I later checked my emails, which is when I was in for another big surprise: ModernAgent, a daily newsletter publication distributed to travel agents around the country had published an article about us, announcing the release of our Alpine Winter Ski Package! That was huge news, as not only this is a widely read publication, but it was also our first exposure in the press! I was overjoyed.

The wonderfulness kept pouring in, as I later received within an hour 2 requests of travel to France, one for a family of 9, and the second for a group of 20.

These 2 days have really been fantastic. The whole team is really proud, and wants to mainly thank Laurent (nicknamed Wawa for the easiness of the pronunciation) who created our wonderful website that retained the attention of the people at Maison de la France.

Thank you Wawa! You’re the best geek ever!

Well it has been quite a journey so far ever since we started our company, BellaTerra Travel. It all started in 2003, when my good friend John Holding and I had this idea of conducting tours in France. John had had this passion about traveling forever and had already traveled extensively throughout the globe. He also knew some people who had a tour operator conducting wine tours in France. As for me, I have a French degree in tourism (the equivalent of an Associates Degree) and have always been in the travel industry since I graduated. So we started playing with the idea and naturally things fell into place. We were very enthusiastic about our project and had a ton of ideas. After setting up the company, we both went to France to explore deeper the regions of France that we already knew and made lots of relationships with providers and charming places to stay. Back home, we printed posters and advertised here and there with our modest budget. The problem was: despite our great intentions, we were not known at all, and we could only set up 2 trips per year without quitting our full time jobs, which made it difficult. For months, nobody signed up. Then came the departure date, and our enthusiasm had taken a toll. Nonetheless discouraged, we gathered our hopes again and planned a new trip. We started giving conferences about the French Alps all over the Bay Area. Our presentations actually attracted a lot of people and despite talking to full rooms of very interested folks, still nobody signed up. However, after each conference, we had many inquiries regarding custom trips to France. Could we arrange custom travel just for a couple? Could we organize excursions, accommodations and car rentals? We were not prepared, but after all being French and in the travel industry, why couldn’t I do it? Suddenly, it was all making sense.

That’s when we decided to follow the trend and therefore modify our scheme. We took requests for custom tours and started building our products from there. We knew very well that the market had a low level of competition: the French Alps for example are hard to find amongst tour operators. A few will offer some ski options, but never any cultural experiences even though the region has so much to offer such as medieval castles, spectacular lakes and mountains and adorable chalets. As for Provence and Paris, even though they are more popular destinations, none of the big tour operators offer the level of personal service and customization. We already had the places picked out as well as the providers, we needed someone to help us with marketing and developing the website. John’s wife, Beth, was the perfect match for the marketing job. She had tons of experience in sales and was a big executive in a software company. My husband Laurent, being a wiz in computers and softwares naturally took the job of crafting our website. Both of them became members of BellaTerra Travel. John having been the CEO and CFO of a big company employing over 1,800 people, doing our accounting and taking care of the paperwork was a walk in the park for him. As for me, I became the Chief Operating Officer in charge of setting up the products and making reservations. With our team completed, we headed into the new path of building custom trips to Paris, the French Alps and Provence.

Life has been really good since then. Slowly, our database of customers started growing until I was able to leave my full time job at a local travel agency and dedicate myself to BellaTerra.

Having so much more time on my hands enabled me to work on the products, provide a high level of customer service, and grow the business with the precious help of my colleagues.

I am getting ready to leave to the South West of France in 2 days. The trip is sponsored by the French Ministry of Tourism to help promote the destination. When I get back, I will have plenty of insights on the region and we will offer exciting new packages and activities in that beautiful area.

Celia Coene

Last week my husband Laurent and I came back from THETRADESHOW. It is a huge travel retailing and destination expo that takes place each year either in Las Vegas or Orlando. This year was Vegas. Not only did we have fun in the city of evil, but we also learned a ton of things and met some cool people.

The trade show was over 3 days and each day had a theme: the first one was about Cruise/Luxury/Destination. We weren’t too interested in that since at BellaTerra we focus on custom trips to France that range mostly from budget to mid-range. The main trade show though was hosting hundreds of providers of all sorts so we spent most of the time going from stand to stand and learning about industry trends and new products.

The second day’s theme was Home-Based Appreciation Day and Business Building. Since we work from our home office, we attended quite a few seminars that day that turned out to be a great source of advice. The seminars were geared especially towards travel agents who were just starting a business, but we gained a lot of confidence as we realized that we were doing a lot of things right in building our business and our brand and in dealing with customer service. Even when you feel that you are going in the right direction in your business, it is always good to hear it from someone else.

The third day was about Business Travel and Technology. It was quite interesting. That’s actually where I got motivated to start this blog. For all of you travel agents who weren’t lucky enough to attend this great event, here is a good CRM custom-made for the travel industry: OpenTravelCRM. A bunch of geeky very nice guys built it from scratch and THETRADESHOW was their first time presenting it to the public. It is completely free and has a lot of useful features such as FIT building and commission tracking. It is still a little bit shaky but I think that if you give them some time it will become a wonderful tool. It works for travel agents as well as for tour operators like us.

After much learning, we were rewarded each night by some great events organized by the committee. We got to try out the brand new hip-and-happening club called LAX at the Luxor. Entrance and drinks were free for us young professionals under 40, who all danced our troubles away on techno music in a gothic/chic decor of chandeliers and red drapes. The last night was the best for me personally: THETRADESHOW had provided me with a ticket to see the Blue Man Group. I have always been a big fan ever since I saw it a few years ago and seeing it again was just exhilarating, despite the fact that my husband had a ticket to another show.

We had a really good time and came back with many new ideas for our business. We will share them with our colleagues and try our best to continue running a successful business. Not only do I love planning custom trips to France for our clients and travel agents, but I also love that we are always so spoiled in the travel industry!

Celia Coene

Howdy all. My name is Celia, I am French and I co-own a tour operator called BellaTerra Travel. In a few words, we sell custom trips to France to individuals and travel agents. I love my job, and as a bonus, I get to work from home. Everything is so cool about it: I talk to people who are in a great place in their life: they are happy and excited about planning a trip. Giving advice that people appreciate is a great feeling.

Who said that travel agents were on the verge of extinction? More and more, I find that people are thirsty for personalized service. Yes it’s true, Expedia, Travelocity and Orbitz have their advantages: they are practical, easy to use and only charge between $5 and $10 service fee. They are so big that they manage to get unbeatable deals on all sorts of travel arrangements. But those who have ever had to change a flight or hotel while away from home will know the value of having a good travel agent. Yes, you might pay a few more bucks for the service. But when you will be stuck at the train station because you missed your train, guess who is there for you to sort it out? Yes! YOUR very own travel agent. Money well spent.

When people call me to arrange a trip to France, they often mention how nice it is to be able to talk to a human who actually listens and gives advice. I find that those travellers are not necessarily looking for the best deal around. They often are limited to a budget, but that doesn’t mean that they travel to save money, but rather to have a good time and they want to make sure that everything goes smoothly. They want personalized service, they want to know the places I liked and the off-the-beaten path adventures. They want good service, friendliness, and advice, even for a few more bucks. And that is why I enjoy it so much.

So Expedia, beware of travel agents. They offer what you will never be able to offer: human contact!

Celia Coene