What Makes a Good Location?

Travel franchise uses locations to increase visibility, and to serve as a travel hub for nearby customers and agents

What is a good location to open a travel agency? Most competing travel franchises use a home-based business model, and they do it for a simple reason: It’s the cheapest way to start a business. Unfortunately, it also limits the potential of your business because you won’t have a professional location to meet clients and host seminars. In operating out of your home, you sacrifice the visibility and credibility that comes with having a retail location. Most importantly, you won’t have a gathering space to groom a group of affiliated travel agents and help them learn from one another and achieve higher sales, which equates to higher commissions for them and higher commissions for you.

So, what do we look for in a location? Expedia Cruises travel agencies are in shopping centers in high-traffic parts of the cities we serve. We recommend spaces that are about 1,000 square feet, and the spaces must be at least 800 square feet. That will give your team a nice work area while also providing you with hosting space for marketing events and seminars. The locations typically start with half a dozen desks that can be easily pushed aside. That way, when a cruise line representative comes to your location to co-host a European or River Cruise event, you’ll have plenty of space to invite customers to learn and have fun.

How we define protected market areas

When you purchase an Expedia Cruises franchise for sale, your store will be located within a designated market area that is based upon demographic criteria including population density, average and median income, and local competition. We define territories by ZIP codes and look for areas with household incomes of $70,000 or more and a resident population of about 200,000. We also study age and shopping patterns when determining the best location for your retail franchise. Our market areas are designed to provide a massive number of likely customers nearby, which makes your marketing more efficient and keeps your store easily accessible to nearby residents who may want to stop in to learn about a new Alaska cruise or Caribbean vacation.

The market area is also designed to provide a strong pool of potential travel agents. The key to growth for an Expedia Cruises owner is to attract, train, and strengthen a team of travel Vacation Consultants — giving them the tools and knowledge to become travel experts and effective salespeople.

A home base for your team

Travel agents who have an office where they can meet clients and ask questions almost always outperform agents who work remotely. Your location becomes their workplace. That’s a wonderful thing, because travel agents tend to be gregarious, kind-hearted people who enjoy working together and sharing ideas so they can help their customers have the vacation of a lifetime. We’re better together. As a franchise owner, you provide leadership, develop partnerships in the community, set up group bookings in your community, and help your team members increase sales.

Continue Learning About Expedia Cruises

For in-depth details about owning a business with Expedia Cruises, download our free franchise brochure by filling out the form below. You can also learn more by reading the essentials about our franchise opportunity here.