Use a Travel Agency to Book Your Spring Break Vacation

Instead of deal directly with the airlines, has it ever occurred to you to use a good travel agency to book your spring break vacation? Airlines will quote you fares and book your flights, but that’s as far as they go. A travel agency can offer discounted fares, advice on spring break destinations, and may have a great deal or two for you and your friends. Spring break is barely two months away, so now is the ideal time to start looking for a travel agency.

If airlines are offering huge discounts to lure money-weary individuals into traveling, imagine the larger discounts that a travel agency can offer. Since travel agents purchase blocks of seats, they can pass on the savings to their customers.

There are numerous travel agencies, but there is only a fraction of those agencies that cater to the special needs of the student travel industry. Although you can use any travel agency to book your spring break vacation, why not choose a travel agency that specializes in student tours and spring break vacations?

Looking for the Right Travel Agency: Tips

Before you book your next spring break vacation, the travel agency must satisfy certain requirements. You may want to look into the following criteria:

· Full Description of Services – Does the travel agency introduce itself adequately to potential customers? Do they have contact numbers, student packages, discount programs, and do they explain the procedures for their spring break packages as well as clearly state their refund policy?

· Variety – Does the travel agency have a wide range of destination choices and do they have hotel categories that meet all budgets? Some travel agencies like to specialize in a certain number of destinations – USA, Canada, or Mexico; some cover the world! When travel agencies can book spring break vacations almost anywhere in the world, that means that they’ve been in the student travel industry long enough and are confident that they can offer far away and exotic destinations without any problems because they belong to a large network of travel professionals;

· Discounts and Deals – Does the travel agency extend discounts for group travel or do they have frequent hot deals to offer? The capability to offer great deals can mean any number of things: they have good relationships with major airlines, hotels and tourist organizations, they receive discounted rates from suppliers and they in turn offer these to student travelers, or they are booking so many flights and vacation packages that they earn free points or free miles. You could be offered a deal to the Bahamas, your destination of choice, because the travel agency happened to receive a deal from a Bahamas tour operator at the time you booked!

· Photographs – Wouldn’t it be nice to see what you are getting into? If you are going to a spring break destination for the first time, you would want to know what kind of hotel you’re staying at, wouldn’t you? It isn’t enough for the travel agency to say, “You’re booked at a 4-star hotel”. You’ll want to know the name and location of that hotel so you can look it up on the Internet or ask people about it, plus you’ll want to see the rooms, dining facilities, and recreational facilities. Some travelers have been dismayed to find out that the hotel had only one treadmill, as opposed to what the travel agency described as a “full operating gym”. Or that the travel agency said 12 tennis courts, when in fact the hotel did not have any, referring travelers instead to a sports center a mile away!

· Interactive web site –Instead of spending precious minutes on the phone asking the travel agent about destinations, packages and vacation amenities, it would be simpler to do the search yourself on their web site by giving you the option to select a city and a package. When you’ve found what you’re looking for, that is when you call and ask for details that weren’t covered on their web site.

· Flexibility – some travel agents require you to pay for their packaged vacations to be able to receive discounts, but some travel agents are flexible in that they allow you to choose only air, or only hotel, or both.

A good travel agency is well organized. This important trait is evident in the way they present travel information. For example, there are websites that are designed to specifically cater to students. They list the cities they serve with a brief article about popular attractions and then you click on a link and the screen displays what their package covers plus costs for the city you selected.

So if you’re using a travel agency to book your spring break vacation, look for an agency that’s efficient, organized and capable of offing some fantastic deals.

Jeremy Foster is a blogger and freelance writer who focuses on the travel industry and vacation tips, often discussing a particular aspect of the travel industry such as working with travel agents.

Find More : Agency Travel , Online Travel , Holidays Travel , travel agents , travel information , group travel , travel industry , travel agencies , travel agency

Thinking About Beauty Courses?

Have you found yourself with a lack of direction? What do you really want in life? If you find that you enjoy dealing with hair and makeup, or simply making other people look attractive, you may consider looking into beauty courses. Most women have people in their lives who are always the one they go to if they need hair styled or nails manicured. If you are that person, you should absolutely consider beauty courses as a way to turn your talent into a career. Of course, beauty courses are more than simply hair and nails. There is a lot of information that must be learned in order to be effective and successful in the beauty business. If you think that this is a career path for you, don’t think that you can set out on your own without taking beauty courses. After all, without these courses, you will have a much more difficult time getting a license. And while hair may always grow back, your clients may not take to kindly to waiting out a bad haircut.

The first thing to know about beauty courses is that, no matter how much innate talent you have, you probably have a lot to learn. You may have used hair dye from a box, but that doesn’t mean that you have to experience to help a high paying client find the exact shade of auburn that will look both attractive and natural. Accidents that take place in the salon and are initiated by those who haven’t taken beauty courses can be extremely damaging. Not only do you put yourself as a business person at risk of a career and business ending lawsuit, but the chemicals you use could cause severe damage to an unsuspecting customer. If you are seriously considering a career in beauty, it is a great idea to begin researching beauty courses. After all, you would probably prefer a higher paying job at a high end salon to working at a cheap shop snipping $15 haircuts. With beauty courses, you can achieve that dream.

Of course, there may be things in your way that make it difficult to fit beauty courses into your life. Perhaps you have children who need supervision. You probably have a day job that you aren’t in a position to give up. Maybe the price of beauty courses is money that you just don’t have. Now is the time to enlist friends and family to help you in your time of need. If you need a babysitter, find a friend and work out a barter system. Maybe you can use some of your skills to offer free haircuts or manicures in exchange for watching the kids for a few hours a week. If you have a day job, many beauty courses may offer night classes for people with your schedule. Of course, if money is the issue, it can make it extremely difficult to overcome. Find out if any family members are willing to invest in your future. If not, start saving! You will find that beauty courses can be a great investment over the long term and can help you achieve your dreams!

I am 23 year old student on my last year of study at the University of Sydney (Sydney), majoring in Information technology.

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Boutique - Online Business Vs Retail Shopping

Have you tried traditional means of selling with little to no success? Do
you have a product driven, home based business that you would like to grow
nationally or even internationally? Are you unsure how to successfully
advertise your web site on the Internet? Does your web site get limited
traffic? Have you been a vendor at various boutiques but want the
continual yearly income that is generated from your loyal customer base?

Retail shopping has been the general source of selling and purchasing
products for decades. With the expansion of the Internet and other various
creative avenues, business owners have been able to grow their business
substantially in less time. Boutiques that have a physical location have
been popular over the last 15 to 20 years. They are extremely enticing to
the growing number of women who enjoy scrapbooking, home decor, holiday
crafts, gift ideas and much more.

Listed below are 8 reasons why an online boutique could increase sales and
grow your business.

1. Year round income: Not only would you have a physical location for your
customers during various times of the year at boutiques, but they would be
able to easily continue to purchase your items year round.

2. It will bring shoppers to you: Retail stores spend hundreds or thousands
of dollars marketing their business. By advertising your online store when
you are a vendor at a boutique, your customers will have an incentive to
purchase additional products later.

3. Linking web sites: If a vendor from a boutique has a web site, the
online boutique can link to the vendor's web site. This will generate
traffic to the vend's web site thereby gaining exposure and sales.

4. Reclaiming old customers: For customers who have not attended a boutique
for years, they could look online to see what is available and either come
back to the boutique or shop on line.

5. Extra income without extra setups and tear downs: Physical boutiques
can be a successful means of establishing and growing a business. It takes
time and effort to set up and take down a booth each show. Once a vendor is
joined into an online boutique, it stays available to the customer night and
day without much added effort.

6. Not enough online boutiques available: A study recently done found that
70% of online shoppers would like to purchase more boutique like items.
There are very few on line boutique sites available.

7. Substantial growth: A person can grow their business without travel
expenses by selling online. National and International growth is possible.

8. Increase sells up to 70%: Some of the most successful business owners
contribute their success to selling online.

9. Eliminating cost of rental space: The average of cost of a rental space
at a virtual boutique is around $125.00. This is usually for a 3 day
exposure time. An online boutique is day and night, everyday, for a minimal
monthly fee.

It is rare today for a business not to have a web site. If done correctly,
web sites can be an invaluable tool for any business owner. The perfect
solution for businesses that do not have a web site themselves, however, is
the ability to tap into the online boutique web site. It is critical to be
educated and informed on the latest marketing and sales tools available.
The competition can be overwhelming without education and progressive
action. Not only will online boutiques become a fun and easy way for people
to shop, they will become a lucrative source of income for many vendors
wanting to expand their business.

Bio: Terri Grace, nineteen years of experience in boutique sales and marketing. Successful business owner of a boutique for the past 5 years. Owner and entrepreneur of an online boutique. For more information on boutiques go to: http://www.terrisbluegooseboutique.com

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Terri_Grace

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