Be a Fora Travel Consultant as a side hustle during the summer of airline chaos

Morgan Pesce, a full-time social media professional and travel and lifestyle blogger in Rhode Island, arrived at Fora Travel in March to become a part-time travel consultant. After a video boarding call, and learning about the startup’s travel agency’s support resources, Pesce booked four trips in April for friends, others in her network, and herself.

The commission checks arrived a few weeks after the trips.

“They talked to me about their mission,” Pesce, 37, said of Fora Travel. “She had met travel agencies before but didn’t like the “big-box, cookie-cutter approach” of Marriott stays and cruises.

Fora Travel’s mission is to reinvent the role of the travel agency and travel agent, empowering enthusiastic travelers as travel advisors and offering benefits and commission checks with very modest training before they start their trip. Fora Travel has $18.5 million in venture funding — something you don’t often see with travel agencies — and sees no reason why it won’t add 100,000 travel advisors to its ranks in relatively short order.

Skift wrote a little earlier about Fora Travel, which was founded last year, but we wanted to learn more about its business model, especially since in the past there were several multi-level marketing programs where companies catered to people who knew nothing about travel. Business benefits for their own trips, and payments for getting their friends to sign up – and so on.

Hotel commissions and membership fees

Evan Frank, former CEO and co-founder of Onefinestay and founder of Fora Travel, told Skift that Fora Travel’s business model revolves around hotel commissions and trips, but eventually charges travel advisors a membership fee and currently offers a $200 referral. Consultants register travel agents and make bookings. Frank co-founded Fora Travel with Henley Vasquez, former CEO and co-founder of Passport, and Jake Peters, former CEO of Peyperx.

“By the way, our best advisors come by referral,” Frank said, speaking from the Virtuoso conference in Las Vegas a few weeks ago. “We don’t want to clip that channel and destroy that. Overall, however, we are not looking to become a multi-level market-driven company. We’ve really focused on our revenue model being driven by demand, by trips.

Veteran travel advisors are often overwhelmed by newbies diving into the industry. These long-time professionals are well-versed in fare classes, international distribution desktop scripts, service charges and taxes, debit notes from airlines, and rescuing angry and angry customers at remote airports, and many have taken nine-over three months of training and e.g. The American Association of Travel Consultants pledges to adhere to the 12-point Code of Ethics on the way to becoming a Certified Travel Consultant.

A business in a box?

Fora Travel is looking to disrupt all of that by offering streamlined training and travel advisors a “business in a box”.

Fora Travel’s Frank said the agency is currently “unique” in not paying to join consultants, but that will change. “Because before we start charging money for them to be part of the training, we want to get our training, our operational onboarding and the overall business, the product experience that we provide to our consultants out of the box.” he said. But as you know, the infrastructure is very expensive. We want to pay some sort of fee to the consultants.

Do not order flights

But how do advisors deal with flight cancellations, lost luggage and all the hassles that have marred the travel experience for travelers around the world in recent months with just their first trip?

That sounds simple: don’t book flights.

“I think the more flights you do, the more you wake up at 2 a.m., which is one of the reasons we try not to focus so much on the flight,” says Frank. “I think if you’re focused on land-based and hotel-based travel, it’s more compatible to be able to do that while supporting other jobs, freelance gigs or whatever.”

The Fora travel consultant, who started her side trip in April, booked three trips that month to Central America — including her own trip to Guatemala — and one to the Florida Keys.

Pesce said she doesn’t typically book flights — although Flora Travel Agents can through agency partners — and can offer recommendations to clients.

The new Fora travel consultant learned about the agency through his Instagram posts, and said she wasn’t interested “if you have to pay to work for them.”

Fora Travel does not yet have its own reservation system, so its agents book directly on hotel websites, although Frank says the agency is building a reservation system powered by an international distribution system.

Pesce said she consulted with her clients through video calls, direct messages and email about their preferences. She primarily booked their accommodations, and as a Fora travel consultant, offered her own travel perks like early check-in and late checkout, a bottle of wine upon arrival, and a $200 resort credit, for example.

Fora Travel, a hosting agency that allows home-based independent contractors to sign up as agents, says, “It’s not uncommon for diligent travel agents to earn six figures.” It said it will offer travel agents and their customers “upgrades and benefits at nearly 4,000 hotels,” including Four Seasons and Design Hotels.

As a member of the Virtuoso Agency Group, Fora Travel Agents can access the benefits that Virtuoso can offer from partners. Since Fora Travel began recruiting earlier this year, about 500 travel consultants have signed up, with about 200 active and a waiting list to sign up, the company said.

Pesce said Fora Travel has a database she can access when she has questions, the training is ongoing and she can connect online with a “great” community of experienced advisors.

“I’ve been lucky so far that I haven’t had any problems,” Pesce said.

Where does this side hustle go?

She also maintains her full-time job as a social media consultant, working maybe a dozen hours a week, depending on how many trips she takes as a travel consultant. Pesce said she would consider becoming a full-time travel consultant if she can build her client list.

“Travel is my favorite thing in the world and it’s amazing to help other people do it,” said Pesce.

A spokesperson for the American Association of Travel Consultants said the group has seen renewed interest in the travel consultant profession.

“However, it is not within ASTA’s purview to determine the success or viability of any business model or industry innovation,” the spokesperson said. “Knowledge and understanding of the vast and complex travel ecosystem are core elements of a successful travel consultant and agency business.”

A spokesperson for the American Association of Travel Consultants declined to comment specifically on Fora Travel and its advisors, but expressed caution about the industry: “Requesting unprovided expertise or promising service can damage the industry’s reputation and jeopardize trust.” Travel Consultants has been providing professional services to their clients for decades.

Frank of Fora Travel said the agency provides certification to its consultants.

It will be up to Pesce and the increasing number of Fora Travel Advisors to decide how much the certification is worth.