And while I was waiting, I opened the envelope. Inside was a simple note from the Tour Company, asking us to welcome the group by name, confirming the count, and saying something I’ve taught in the Seminar for years. And I quote:

“P.S. DO NOT GIVE THIS GROUP RECEIPTS OR REFUNDS! Any receipts or refunds go to <name of Tour Company>. If you have any questions, please call <name of Tour Company> at <phone number>. After 5:00PM, please call <tour planner’s name> at <cell phone number>.”

I’ve told my story of a total screwup regarding payment in the Seminar program (and I even have a short video of that section online as a preview of the Seminar program itself…if you insist on seeing it, it’s at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EJLfipoj74g). But this is the first time I’ve actually been handed something directly from the Tour Company. How often must this be a problem that they have to send letters along with the groups?

So, are you careful about who you discuss financial or contractual arrangements with? Have you ever given it a thought? I’m guessing there are a lot of people out there who are not being careful, given this letter from the Company. Can I encourage you to go the extra mile, and be very cautious in knowing who you are allowed to discuss certain confidential matters with? It really is important to your customer (and anything important to your customer should be very important to you!!)!

The flight from Harrisburg to Toronto was one of the smallest commercial planes I’ve ever flown on…16 total seats! That’s all…wow. I’ve never been on a plane where the Flight Steward was also the Co-pilot! He did the talk, checked seat belts, then went and sat in the right seat up front! Every once in a while, he’d open the door, take a look back to make sure we were all OK, then shut it and get back to flying the plane. I was a bit concerned, but it was a fairly steady flight for such a small plane!

The convention itself was great, as always.  OMCA is my #2 show every year now, as our friends north of the border love to come to Lancaster County for shopping, touring, and shows.  We have several very good customers in Ontario, and the relationships continue to grow and deepen, which is always the goal.

But it goes deeper at OMCA…for the second year in a row, I was surprised by how outgoing and friendly Canadians are.  As part of the conference, they hold a Round Table Discussion, which is becoming more and more popular throughout the industry.  It’s kind of a reverse appointment…a table full of suppliers sit, and the Operators move from table to table.  It’s not supposed to be a selling time, but instead a chance for us to learn from the Operators what they’re dealing with, and how we can help them.  Of course, people always want to try to sell…I even heard that, at one table, an Operator had to stop people, and remind them that “this is not selling time.”

What really surprised me at the Round Table was how many Operators that I met for the first time last year, who remembered me, and were very gracious about how much they love our theatres.  I’m lousy with remembering faces (yes, that does explain why I looked at you funny, until I remembered who you are), but these folks make an art form out of remembering people, their properties, and good experiences their groups had.

But it’s the networking time at OMCA that always shines…whether it’s the Icebreaker, a dine-around opportunity (or two), or just sitting in the lobby bar at the end of the evening talking, these are people who honestly want to get to know you, and work with you.  They are very genuine, and I really like that.

Other random thoughts…we had dinner in the Japanese Teppan Yaki restaurant in the hotel, and that was just amazing.  Our chef (who we named Bob, since we couldn’t pronounce or understand his real name) was awesome, and did everything you expect from that type of cooking (the volcano made from onions, breaking an egg on the side of the spatula, and landing a pepper shaker in his hat).  The food was excellent, the conversation was excellent, everything was excellent.  And I even ate a piece of sushi, which I swore I would never do.  I wouldn’t eat it every day, but it was tasty!

And I have a new favorite Broadway Musical…it’s not for everyone, and the language will put some people to flight.  But I grew up listening to Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons, so “Jersey Boys” was nothing short of flawless.  The performers were vibrant, the sets and costumes perfect, and the singing was spot on.  Led by the signature falsetto singing of Frankie, if you closed your eyes you were sure that the real Four were standing there! We were all on our feet, singing along by the end of the show (OK…I was singing along the whole time, but I was NOT alone in that).  Highest recommendation if you remember the 60’s (and are immune to a lot of F-Bombs dropping all around you).

I find myself already looking forward to OMCA in 2009 in London (and 2010 in Niagara Falls, and 2011 in Windsor).  If you’re interested in motorcoach business from Canada, it comes highly recommended.

Biggest surprise of the weekend? No, it’s not how badly I played golf (that was a given)…it was how badly the Gaylord botched their handling of the convention! For a property that’s always been top notch for past conventions I’ve attended at the Opryland and the Texan, VMA was a mess for them! Examples? Sure…how about:

· Not having the Marketplace room ready on time, and making everyone (Operators, group leaders and suppliers) wait nearly 30 minutes until it was ready.

· Letting their serving team clear dishes (with plenty of loud clanking and banging) while entertainment was going on in the same room.

· Taking a site visit from a potential future customer right through the room while the annual Awards Dinner was in progress.

· Losing plenty of packages that were shipped in advance, then creating some of the absolute lamest excuses ever heard (bottles of wine for the convention were found in the housekeeping area; a lost package was found 5 days after they signed for it’s receipt, but the supplier was expected to pay shipping and a handling fee to have it shipped back; others were just never found, even though UPS had proof of delivery).

And there was plenty more, but the point is made. The hotel is beautiful (as all Gaylord properties are), the hotel staff was very good, but the convention staff was very poor. It was like you were entering a completely different property when you walked down the short hall connecting the hotel to the convention center. I know they will get everything fixed in short order, and most definitely before ABA goes in there in 16 months!

Of course, the highlight for many (their words, not just mine) was a special performance by Amanda Carlisle, who had just completed a run as Maria in our production of The Sound of Music. She was driving home on Sunday, so she was able to stop by and sing a few songs for the assembled attendees. Absolutely delightful…she told some great stories about life on stage, sang like the proverbial bird, and enthralled everyone with her professionalism, her abilities, and, of course, her voice.

And now we’re hard at work here…September 27-30, 2009, VMA will be in Lancaster County!  Staying at Willow Valley, visiting certain theatres (and maybe some other properties), and getting everyone excited about the area once again.  We’ve already come up with some phenomenal ideas, so if you’re a VMA member, clear the time on your calendar now!  If you’re not a VMA member, it’s only $200 a year to join, so come join us for a huge Lancaster County Party next September!!

It started with IMG in Chantilly, VA in early August. Great seeing everyone again, and talking about where the business is heading from here. Lots of “forward thinkers” at IMG, and it’s good to hear from their fertile minds!

GLAMER came next, in Harrisburg and Washington, DC. Low turnout in DC, but overall good shows.

And then off to Charlotte for the ABA Orientation Center committee meeting. What a jammed couple of days…the meetings were extremely productive, the committee is extremely dedicated, and Charlotte is extremely ready! I’m already so jazzed…some of the events planned for January already have my motor running! The evening at Lowes Motor Speedway is going to be a real thrill, the sightseeing tour featuring the Petty Driving Experience will be amazing, and I’ve already put together my team for the Bowling Event.

Yep…bowling. This year, the MAC Gives Back effort is for Breast Cancer research and elimination. The first night, we’re holding a bowling tournament to raise funds, and since I’m part of MAC by being on the OC committee, I’ve already invited members of my gang to bowl with me for this cause. I’m thrilled that we’ll have a couple of Operators on my team. In fact, we had so many who wanted to be on the team that we may start a second team, with me captaining one, and Emi captaining the other.

The entire concept of MAC Gives Back is so important…we frequently visit these towns for conventions, and don’t do anything to thank the community for their overwhelming support. Steve Haddad got this started in Grapevine, and it should continue for many years to come. It is so important to give something back when someone takes good care of you, and I look forward to giving back to Charlotte!

Virginia Motorcoach is next on the docket, at the new Gaylord National in Washington DC (ok…it’s in National Harbor, but since that “town” doesn’t appear on any map or GPS yet, we’ll just call it DC). I can’t wait to see this place…having stayed at the Gaylord Opryland and the Gaylord Texan, I’m sure it’s going to be spectacular. If you’re there, come say “hi”, and if you’re playing golf, have mercy! I’ve played once in the last 19 years, so I’m sure it will be a very sad site to behold.

ABA Fever has us in it’s grasp again…after a challenging time, my hotel in Charlotte is reserved (having been a web programmer for 10 years, my heart goes out to the programming staff at ABA and Visit Charlotte!). Since there was a bunch of us who wanted to stay in the Westin together, there were a LOT of emails and phone calls back and forth during the first half-hour of hotel registration!

And I get to do it all over again on Wednesday, when Attraction registration opens up. I’ll be in Hanover, PA at a York CVB Group Meeting, but I’ve already checked that the hotel where we’re meeting has free Wi-Fi, and I’ll take my laptop over there to be sure I get registered as close to the top of the list as I can.

Why? Why all this OCD behavior? Well, I AM OCD, but it’s more than that. With ABA, your order of registration effects your appointment requests. So the earlier you register, the better a chance you have of getting the appointments you ask for. It’s the same for the hotel…since there are 7 hotels on the “official” list, and probably around 3,500 people trying to get in, the earlier you register, the better a chance you have of getting the hotel you want. Since the Westin is right across the street from the Convention Center, we decided it would be the best for quick changes and forgotten materials.

If you’re like me, I have a small gift for you! I use iGoogle, the new customizable version of Google’s home page, where you can add modules of a wide variety (news feeds, weather forecasts, calendars, and more). I created a module that is a countdown to ABA Charlotte, and it’s free for anyone who wants to use it. You can get to it via: http://tinyurl.com/5r924l if you want to add it to your page.

See you in Charlotte (if not before in Chantilly or Toronto or Pittsburgh or…)!

Nope…not us! We decided to pick the one brochure that caught our eyes out of an amazing array of information from our welcome bags, and go see something really different. So we piled into Cheryl’s car, and off we went, with the GPS leading the way. Did we go to Cape May for the Victorian homes and tours? Did we go to Historic Cold Spring Village for some history, or the Cape May County Park Zoo to see the animals?

Nope…not this bunch! We went to see LUCY!

Some of you are nodding and laughing right now, and others are scratching your heads. Lucy, you see, is a six-story tall elephant, located right on the beach in Margate, just south of Atlantic City. She was built in the 1800’s by a real estate tycoon as a way to attract people to Margate, then to buy land off him to build their bungalows. She has been an apartment, a tavern, and the anchor to a hotel next door. But whatever she has been, she is probably one of the most unique places you’ll ever see! You walk up a very tight spiral staircase in her left rear leg, look out through her eye (eight miles into the ocean, if you believe the hype). You climb another tight staircase to the Howdah (the thingy on her back) for another view of the Jersey Shore (from Ocean City to Atlantic City on a clear day).

But what’s really important is not where we went, it’s why we went. We found something unique, and wanted to see it. And, when we got back to the PBA Meeting, you can betcha we told everyone about what we found in Margate! I know of a couple of Operators who are going to check it out on their next visit, just from the enthusiasm we had for the lady. We were even designated the “Lucy Fanclub” at the closing lunch the next day, due to our cheering when Lucy’s name was announced as a sponsor of the week’s activities (hey, laugh all you want…Heather is sending all four of us some totally cool Lucy swag!).

So, is there a Lucy in your town? Is there something so hokey, so strange, so bizarre that you just stand and stare at it? Well, don’t discount it…it just may be a ticket to increased business, as there’s always someone looking for just something like that. I’m going to be looking for our Lucy around here…you never know when you’ll find her, and fall in love with her.

I’m already looking forward to taking my kids to see her, and I just found out that some of us from the Theatre are going to AC later this year to see a show. Wanna bet I invite all my co-workers to go see something they’ve never seen before?

I can hear you now…”are you nuts?”. Well, yes I am, but you already knew that! I am also a loose cannon, and I freely admit it. I have friends around me who’s job (along with simply being my friend) is to be my anchor. They keep me from floating off into the clouds on wings of an idea that won’t work. I highly recommend it for everyone who is an “idea person”. It’s so easy to get so wrapped up in the wonder of a concept that you lose hold of reality in the process. So I welcome the chance to sit down and make sure I’m not going way above and beyond reality.

Kevin asked me to do something that really got me thinking. He asked me to sit down and analyze every show, convention, marketplace, and outside event that I do throughout the course of a year. How much do we pay for dues, registrations, and ancillary costs? And, more importantly, to prioritize the shows by which shows are:

1. Critical/Mandatory/Indispensable [15%] (this activity is directly attributable to the Company’s future success, and it drives revenues in the group area)

2. Required/Obligatory [20%] (In order to continue in our business, this cost must be incorporated into the business plan)

3. Basic Activity/Necessary, but not Vital [30%]

4. Not critical but needed [20%]

5. Not a priority/discretionary/optional [15%]

But it goes a little deeper than that…he also assigned a percentage that each category must fit into (those are the numbers in brackets above). So I can’t just make “my favorite” shows all #1…it must break down against the flow of percentages he outlined. It took several tries at realigning the priorities (and that work will continue, I’m sure), but that’s where the real benefit came in. In order to get the right number, I really had to look at some shows and be brutally honest with myself. Yes, I dearly love the people and the show in X, but how much business comes from it? Would we suffer if we weren’t there?

In the old days, this theatre was EVERYWHERE! We used to joke about Joanie going to every show under the sun…in fact, we used to tell people who asked about any group show anywhere to “go ask Joanie…she’s been there already”. In this day and age of spiraling gas prices and decreasing motorcoach traffic, we just can’t afford to be EVERYWHERE any longer! We have to make certain that the money being spent is money well spent! Does this mean I may not get to go to a show in XX? It just might. But my job is not just to sell seats, but also to be responsible for my spending.

This is a task I would strongly encourage you to do as well! If you need a sample spreadsheet to get you started, let me know, and I’ll send you mine (of course, without my numbers in it!). Sit down and go through your expenses…as I say in the Seminar, if you’re doing a show because it’s in a town you always wanted to visit, you’re doing it for the wrong reason! If you’re doing a show because the ROI is good, you’re on track. But you aren’t going to know if you don’t do this kind of work every once in a while.

Sure, it took me over a week to get it done, since I was working on it between phone calls, seating groups, and other responsibilities, but it was really worth it. I can see re-doing this about every couple of years or so, just as a “mid-course adjustment” tool (of course, I may disagree with myself in three years!).

And imagine the look on your friendly neighborhood business manager’s face when you hand them this analysis…they might even smile at you (for the record, our business manager ALWAYS smiles at us…)!

It’s a valid question, and raises a short-coming I don’t mean to reflect here. I work every day, so going away is not back to work for me. Sure, I love the shows, and really blossom when I’m in that environment. But I work between the shows as well, so I need to stop using that phrase so much!

I work the phone (followup calls, cold calls, inbound calls from prospective customers), I work email very heavily (I have a number of our best customers who do nearly all their business via email these days), and I write letters, posts, faxes, articles, and anything else I can find to write. As you may be able to tell from this blog, I like to write, and do so as much as I can. For someone who spent many years in radio, you’d think I would prefer speaking…but I nearly always wrote things out when I had something major to say on the air, or at least outlined it, so writing has always been part of what I do.

Actually, I’ve had several people say I should write a book on Group Sales. The Seminar is completely scripted, word for word. I don’t always stick strictly to those exact words, but I wrote the entire thing out. I could easily convert that into a book format, but I wonder if it would hurt the seminar to make it available in book format as well. I like to write, but I LOVE to teach!

When it comes to working with customers, it all comes down to what they want! I teach in the seminar that one question that must be asked of every customer is “how do you want me to contact you?”. And I use that information constantly…if XYZ Tours wants to be contacted via email, that’s how I contact them. If there’s something extremely important or confusing, I will call them, but I take their request to heart, and use their preferred method as much as I can.

So please forgive any confusion…when I go to a trade show, I’m not going “back to work”, and I promise not to use that phrase any more.

“Where will the next generation of groups come from?”

We all know that, sadly, the “blue-haired ladies”, and their spouses/friends/significant others are leaving us. It’s a natural attrition that has happened for years…as the older generation passes on, another generation takes their place. Unfortunately, the new generation coming onboard is my generation — Baby Boomers. While “The Greatest Generation” has had no qualms about traveling together on motorcoaches, our generation is not interested. We are the “but we’re still young” generation, and we don’t need buses to travel. We don’t need to be stuck on a bus for that long! We can still fly or drive wherever, and we have no problem with doing that.

So how do we reach them? How do we convince these self sufficient people to hop on a bus with 50 other people and travel together? There are several approaches that are starting to work…and, of course, the price of gas is helping as well. Now it’s getting cheaper to travel on a coach than to drive by yourself.

ABA’s “Save a Penguin” campaign will help…as the word spreads, I think we’ll see an increase of Boomers going by coach, since many of us are environmentally conscious (or at least pretend to be). The more we can help get that word out, the more it’s going to help increase motorcoach business.  Carbon Footprints didn’t even exist a couple of years ago, now more and more people are checking on theirs, and trying to minimize their impact on the environment.

Then there’s “Social Networking”, or Web 2.0 as some call it. Our generation, along with the GenX and GenY generations, are getting more and more active online, and sharing with each other. It used to be that MySpace and Facebook were “just for the kids”, but more and more Boomers are getting pages, and sharing their lives with others. So I’m out there too….I have pages on MySpace, Facebook and LinkedIn, and I’m having a lot of fun with Twitter. I’m still learning how these things work, but if I can be out there in some form, I can tweak it as I find what people are looking to see. And if there’s a social site that I’m not on, post a comment below, and we’ll meet there!

Look for me out there in the Social Sphere, and let’s be friends, or follow each other, or whatever they call it. As my mother always said, “Listen…I couldn’t hurt!”.

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I don’t think I’ve found many things in the Group Sales World that seem to “polarize” people as much as GLAMER shows do. Either you love ‘em like crazy, or you absolutely despise them. I used to be on the other side of the fence…many years ago, I did the GLAMER show in Philadelphia (had a booth next to the Dutch Apple, actually…amazing how often things come around full circle). I thought the show was hideous, and swore I’d never do them again. Worse than a trick-or-treat show, it was just a mess. The group leaders who attended did not care about anything except what freebies we had, and actually walked away while I was trying to tell them about the Choo Choo Barn. Rude? Oh, yeah.

But Joan Payne, the Dutch Apple’s Group Sales Director at the time (and one of my mentors in the biz) loved GLAMER shows, and did upwards of 6-8 of them every year. She booked business, she made friends, and she did very well with the shows. She and I talked after the show in Philly, and she tried to explain how to work with people like that.

It was the first time I had ever encountered what’s now referred to in Marketingspeech as an “elevator pitch”. Can you sell your property in 30 seconds or less? The name, if you’ve never heard it before, refers to being able to pitch your property in the time it takes for the elevator to get to the ground floor of the hotel where you and your “target” are staying. A booth at GLAMER really required being fluent in your elevator pitch!

Fast forward several years…GLAMER has changed, and so have I. I’ve got a ton more experience, I have my elevator pitch down cold, and GLAMER isn’t a freebies show any longer. No booths, no pop-ups, no displays at all. You sit, and the group leaders have signature cards. In fact, they can’t win any goodies at lunch unless they speak with everyone there. I love signature cards…they guarantee you a “captive audience”. They walk up to your table, hand you their card, and they aren’t going anywhere until you give that card back! They have to listen to you, ’cause you’re holding them up with that card.

Now, don’t be abusive, and don’t hold them an excessive amount of time, but that card guarantees you have time to tell them about your property, and give them your information (not necessarily your swag…you can actually give them brochures, schedules, and other promotional information).

But GLAMER is home to another important Group Sales skill that many of us don’t like to talk about. That’s FOLLOWUP! GLAMER leaders are the type of people who must be “touched” at least 3 times before you can expect anything from them. It doesn’t necessarily have to be phone calls, but I always make that call my last “touch”, and it does work. I will send them out a followup letter about a month after the show (once the CD with all the leads arrives), then give them a call about a month after that. No pressure…”just wanted to see if you received the information I sent you about 2009, and see if I could answer any questions for you”.

So I do four GLAMER shows every year, and I really like them! Actually, I was just doing three, but last year, I missed the Baltimore date due to a personal conflict, so I did Washington, DC instead, and it was amazing! Lots of people who knew nothing about us, but wanted a new place to take their groups. So I’m going back there this August, along with Baltimore, Philadelphia and Harrisburg. And I’m going to think about adding a couple more next year, if these continue to work well.

If you’re not doing GLAMER, and you understand about how to work followup the right way, you might give GLAMER a try again. I know that the suppliers I talk to at the shows do speak very highly of it! Might be worth a shot to boost your traffic! Of course, as with everything in this business, YMMV! If you don’t know what that means, please hire me for the Group Sales Seminar, and I’ll teach you…

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