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With filmmaker Ken
Burns at Tauck’s New
Orleans jazz event. 40
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host
THE NATIONAL NEWSPAPER OF THE TRAVEL INDUSTRY
OCTOBER 17, 2011
Kuwait plays catch-up
[ WILL COMPETITION SPUR UPGRADES? ]
OTAs’ flaws loom
larger as Google
moves into travel
By Johanna Jainchill
Private interests in the oil-rich
nation hope to boost leisure visits,
The Kuwait City water-
front and skyline.
By KENNETH KIESNOSKI
Page 18
The coalition known as FairSearch.org failed
to stop Google’s acquisition of ITA Software
earlier this year, but it is keeping alive its
struggle to stop what FairSearch characterizes as the search giant’s threat to competition, innovation and jobs in the online travel
space.
While Google’s entrance makes any sector
shudder, a major source of FairSearch’s concern could be that the online travel market,
despite its many players and years of technological advances, has a long way to go to
meet the needs of its consumer and trade
customers.
In other words, the fear is that Google has
the resources and the smarts to be not only
bigger but better.
FairSearch, which includes online travel agencies Expedia and Travelocity and
metasearch engine Kayak, was formed last
year to lobby against Google’s $700 million
Group biz is lost opportunity for many
By Michelle Baran
Suppliers and group specialists alike say
that adds up to a missed opportunity.
“You’re crazy if you don’t do groups,” said
Ken Schwinn, owner of Schwinn Tours &
Travel in Bonita Springs, Fla. “Financially, it
can be very rewarding because not only do
you have a number of people traveling on
the same itinerary but you’re also upping
your agency into a higher commission
bracket.”
Schwinn, who has been work-
ing with groups for more than
three decades, got his start as a
teacher traveling with student
groups. He eventually opened his
own agency, and groups now ac-
count for 50% to 60% of his business.
It seems like simple economics:
Book a group of people rather than
individual passengers and make
more money. But finding
and making travel arrangements for these at-times elusive — or perhaps exclusive — groups
has proved a challenge for
many agents.
MAKING MONEY
industry between those in the groups market, who generally shout its profitability from
the rooftops, and a large part of the retail
travel community who for various reasons
have hesitated to enter this market.
“There’s a huge group market out there
that, for whatever reason, the agents have
passed over,” said Charlie Presley, chairman
and founder of Group Leaders of America,
or Glamer. “I have never understood why.
You really gotta go out and sell. They’re not
going to come to you.”
As the economy continues to sputter and
uncertainty grips the industry, those in the
groups market tout its potential for agents
looking to increase revenue opportunities.
One supplier that is pushing harder into
the groups market and hoping to bring
See GROUPS on Page 39
‘Suppliers have one mission
and consumers have anoth-
er, and they don’t match.’
Carroll Rheem, PhoCus Wright
acquisition of ITA, which was approved in
April by U.S. antitrust authorities with stiff
conditions.
Google’s entrance into the world of flight
search in September, using the technology it
acquired with the ITA deal, further rankled
the online travel industry.
FairSearch sent all 50 state attorneys general a 44-page paper titled “Google’s Transformation From Gateway to Gatekeeper:
How Google’s Exclusionary and Anticom-petitive Conduct Restricts Innovation and
Deceives Consumers.” The paper outlined
the coalition’s concerns about Google’s business practices.
Google has declined to respond officially
