Dive Industry Network
Familiarization (FAM) Trips
By Gene Muchanski, Executive Director,
Dive Industry Association, Inc.

FAM Trips for Travel Advisors

 The travel industry has been using familiarization trips for many years to entice Travel Agents, now called Travel Advisors, to learn more about their properties, in hopes of getting increased bookings.  Actually, it is more than just learning about their properties.  It’s about developing a relationship with Travel Advisors and becoming a preferred supplier in the Advisor’s arsenal of travel destinations that they sell to their customers.  That makes a lot of sense to me.  You want my business?  Show me.  Better yet.  You want my business, impress me!

The Travel Industry vs the Diving Industry:  The last time I checked; the Travel Industry was a 4 trillion-dollar industry.  Not so much with the diving industry.  One thing is for certain.  Adventure dive travel is very important to our industry and the travel stakeholder group accounts for a great deal of the industry’s total revenue.   Some may even say that adventure dive travel is one of the main reasons people get certified.  Speaking from my personal experience, the only time I purchase diving equipment is when we are getting ready for a dive trip.  Why would I buy gear if I wasn’t going diving?  I don’t buy camera equipment if I’m not going to be taking pictures.

There is no question about it.  We get certified to go diving.  We buy gear when we go diving.  Equipment, training, and travel are so dependent on each other.  But as a recreational industry, do we know enough about the travel industry to make the most of its vast opportunities and perks?  Do we know the difference between an industry and a market?  Do we know the difference between a business partner and a customer?  More importantly is that we know how these differences affect the relationships between buyers and sellers of equipment, training, and travel.  My feeling is that if I have to pay you, I’m your customer.  If you pay me to bring you business, I’m your business partner.

Our mission is to bring buyers and sellers together for mutual benefit but before we can do that, we must first understand the roles that each sector plays in the movement of goods and services of the supply and demand chains, through the industry’s channel of distribution.

What Are Diving FAM Trips?   In the diving industry, FAM trips are short visits to a diving resort destination or liveaboard.  Mostly resorts.  A typical FAM Trip to a Caribbean destination is usually 3-5 days in length.  One day in, one day out, and three days at the resort.  This includes three days of 2 tank diving and maybe an extra dive or two.  The idea of a familiarization trip is to introduce a Wholesale or Retail Travel Buyer to a new diving resort destination and give them a taste of the resort’s accommodations, cuisine, and diving.  It’s not meant to be a free, full week vacation, just a sampling of what the resort has to offer to their guests.  More exotic dive destinations across the globe may be a little longer in length due to the travel time involved.  Either way, most FAM Trips include the option to extend your stay for a minimal charge.

Who are FAM Trips For?  Familiarization Trips are designed for Wholesale and Retail Travel Buyers.  People who sell dive travel or run group trips for their travel business, dive store, or dive club.  Successful Dive Travel Wholesalers, like Roatan Charter, put a disclaimer on their FAM Trip Ads, “Only Available to Our Dive Shop Partners.  2 Person Limit Per Dive Shop.”   That makes it clear who their target market is.  As Dive Travel Consultants, we are always on the lookout for high volume group trip operators to refer to dive resort destinations.  For high volume travel buyers, dive resorts are willing to roll out the red carpet to impress new potential high-volume customers.  It’s like the casinos in Las Vegas.  They make it their point to acquire and retain high rollers who do a lot of gambling with them.

Familiarization Trips are designed for different levels of the dive travel industry’s channel of distribution.  Most Dive Travel Wholesalers are excellent candidates for consideration.   Travel Wholesalers in the diving industry are travel businesses and travel advisors.  They are licensed and bonded travel professionals.  They are in the business of selling travel packages to individuals and groups.  On a wholesale level, they target Dive Stores, Dive Clubs, and Tour Operators to sell to.  This is the primary group that dive resorts and liveaboards want as their business partners.   Dive Travel Wholesalers have extensive websites and travel catalogs, featuring the properties they do business with. They promote their business at trade and consumer shows that feature adventure dive travel.

The second group to consider for a FAM Trip are Dive Stores that have a dive travel program.   Dive stores that book group travel trips should be a high priority for dive resort destinations.  Dive clubs that have a dive travel program or even an annual dive trip also make excellent contacts for resort destinations looking to increase their occupancy rate.  Another category that has grown in recent years are Tour Operators who run escorted group trips to diving resorts and liveaboards.  Tour Operators are legitimate businesses that set up group travel trips and usually accompany their group on the trip.   The best way to understand how the travel sector works is to put yourself in the shoes of the resort destination owners.    They are in the business of selling time and space, 365 days a year.  They are of course, always looking for customers, but if they can attract and retain repeat customers who bring large groups of divers to their resort, so much the better.  So, regardless of whether their customers are Dive Travel Wholesalers, Dive Stores, or Tour Operators, there is a way to work with them through a cohesive channel of distribution.  That is why working with Industry Planners like us, becomes beneficial.  Through advertising, promotions, shows & events, and organized FAM trips, industry planners work to bring travel buyers and sellers together.

In this article, we will be talking about some new ways FAM Trips can become more successful and profitable.  Based on the number of FAM Trips we’ve been involved with, there are definite improvements and adjustments that can be made to turn a stale, pale, event into a successful campaign.  You just have to define the outcome you are trying to achieve and make the necessary adjustments to the way you have always been conducting your promotions.  You’ll be surprised at the benefits a few small improvements can make.

Who are Familiarization Trips NOT for?   FAM trips are not for the person who is looking to go diving for free.  For those of us who have been on a FAM trip or two before, you realize that it is a lot of work.  Sure, it can be fun, especially with a good group and a great host.  But think of a FAM trip as a learning experience to get yourself familiar with a new resort destination.  As a professional seller of travel programs, the more you learn about one of your properties, the better you can represent it to your customers.  First of all, there is nothing better than a firsthand, face-to-face experience at a resort destination.  You’ll learn about the country, the airline that gets you there, the resort, the diving operation, and the group of FAM participants you’ll spend a few days with.  You’ll experience firsthand the resort’s check-in and check-out procedures, the organization of the resort, the dining experience, the service experience, and you’ll interact with the resort staff who you will hopefully see again on your return trip.  There is nothing better in my opinion than diving with the resort’s diving operation and interacting with their crew.  By the time you finish a successful FAM Trip, you will be better prepared to represent that property to your customers.  Believe me, FAM Trips are more than just diving.

How To Qualify for FAM Trips:  Register with the Dive Industry Association.  We have a Retail Travel Buyer survey you can fill out.  We are looking at your history of booking group trips.  Do you currently book group trips?  How many trips have you booked?  How many divers have you taken?  Do you currently use a Dive Travel Wholesaler?  We have access to 23 Dive Travel Wholesalers, in addition to hundreds of dive resorts and liveaboards.  We do our best to follow FAM trips that are offered throughout the year.  We can make a referral on your behalf.  You can also register with any Dive Travel Wholesaler who runs FAM Trips.  They may have a waiting list.  You should definitely let your current Dive Travel Wholesaler know you are interested in FAM Trips.  They will already be familiar with your group trip booking history.

Who Sponsors FAM Trip?  FAM Trips are normally conducted by Tourism Boards, Dive Resorts, Dive Operators, or Dive Travel Wholesalers.  Depending on who the sponsors are, the trip itinerary may vary from group to group.  Sometimes a FAM Trip is sponsored by one group and conducted by another.  Although any single Tourism Board, Dive Resort, or Dive Travel Wholesaler can conduct a FAM Trip, it can be a very expensive and time-consuming event to plan.  The timing of the trip has to be favorable to the participant.  Choosing the correct dates are important to the resort because they should not take valuable space away from their peak season clients, yet they may give a false bad impression if they conduct the trip in their off season.  It’s best if the resort and dive operators are busy, but not too busy.  Again, it all depends on the number of FAM Trip participants.  I’ve seen FAM Trips conducted for groups as small as 4 and as large as 35.

Over the past 40 years, I’ve seen Tourism Boards, Dive Resorts, Liveaboards, Dive Operators, and Dive Travel Wholesalers spend hundreds of thousands of dollars promoting their individual businesses at trade shows and consumer dive shows.  Equipped with a box full of printed brochures and a small 10 x 10-foot booth, I just don’t see how they could be happy with that kind of presentation.  Many of them don’t even bring a laptop computer with a video presentation of their property.  No offense, but the same thing goes for many of the Dive Travel Wholesalers.  The time and resources invested to exhibit at a dive show does not necessarily produce the same results that a face-to-face, hands-on experience at a FAM Trip can produce.   It might be a good idea to analyze the results you get from a trade or consumer show, compared to the bookings you get from sponsoring a FAM Trip.  See which one produces better results.

Even though the travel business is big business, it is still very competitive.  Dive destinations are basically selling heads on beds and butts on seats, with a shelf life of one day.  The opportunity to sell yesterday’s spot today doesn’t exist.  Comparatively, the diving industry is very small.  The numbers of traveling divers may be significant, but the total universe of customers is finite.  We have over 1,000 dive travel businesses in our database.  Why would one resort be more attractive than another?  That goes the same for the Islands of the Caribbean.  My favorite place.  We have over 30 major islands we correspond with and over 70 tourism bureaus in our database, and yet I still ask why we should recommend one island over the other?

Although many of the Caribbean Islands are united in their promotion of Caribbean tourism, they are still competing amongst themselves for our travel dollars.  I don’t see why more links in the travel supply chain do not combine their efforts to promote an integrated familiarization trip for the industry’s best dive travel buyers?  An integrated FAM Trip that is jointly sponsored by an island’s tourism board, major dive resorts, dive operators, and island dive stores would be of significant importance for Dive Travel Wholesalers, Dive Stores, and Tour Operators to attend.  I could sell an annual FAM Trip like that to our Industry.

Making FAM Trips Better:  Remember what I said about treating your business partners like customers?  That’s the first thing that has to change in order to produce better income generating FAM trips.  Resort destinations cannot be so short sighted that they try to make money off FAM trip participants.  The end goal is to book group trips with these participants and make money from their customers.  That’s why we screen our Retail Travel Buyers.  We recommend dive stores that have a history of conducting successful group trips.  They get on our list because they are industry rain makers and deserve the respect and special treatment they get from travel vendors.  They book group trips and lots of them.

Having an individual dive resort or travel wholesaler sponsor a FAM Trip is the norm in our industry, although it does have its limitations on the quality and quantity of incentives that can be offered.  An improvement that would make FAM Trips more productive and desirable would be to integrate the number of links in the supply chain as sponsors of the FAM Trip.  Each link in the supply chain has a purpose in the flow of goods and services in their channel of distribution.  When Tourism Boards and Bureaus are involved in sponsoring the trips, they sometimes give inland funded credit to the participants to spend on their trip.  I’ve seen $200 and $300 credits given by the Virgin Islands and the Bahamas Tourism Boards.  It is an incredible incentive to visit the island.  It would work in Bonaire if the Tourism Bureau would waive the $75 Tourism Tax they charge individual tourists.  Isn’t $75 a good investment to entice a tour operator to bring a group of 30 divers to Bonaire?  That would be an extra $2,250 in revenue for Bonaire, by the way.

A major resource for a Caribbean Island, or any destination for that matter, are the airline carriers.  Airlines have a vested interest in selling airfare to destinations.  Has anyone ever tried to get the airlines to participate as a sponsor in a FAM Trip?  I’ve been on FAM Trips where the airline fee was discounted or provided by the airlines.  My favorite airline is Southwest Airlines because two of my bags fly free.  Good to know for divers and underwater photographers.  When guests arrive at the destination airport, let’s not forget to consider the local ground transportation services and the local restaurants and bars.  They all have a vested interest in promoting tourism.

Our FAM to St Lucia was very pleasurable and well organized.  We stayed in one resort the entire trip.  That was a plus in my book, because our group did not have to change hotels.  We did, however, visit a few resorts which gave us a good sampling of the resorts on the island.  On a different FAM trip we changed hotels in Dominican Republic and I think that took away from the flow of our trip.  In my opinion, a resort visit is sufficient to learn about a new property.  When it comes to the resort’s dive operation, I prefer to dive with a different dive operator each day.

Some Dive Travel Wholesalers may disagree with me on this one.  In St Lucia, I had the pleasure to be on a FAM trip with two travel wholesale companies, a number of dive store travel buyers, and a non-diving travel advisor.   I think that mixing Resort Managers, Dive Travel Wholesalers from different companies, and Retail Travel Buyers on a FAM trip can be a very synergetic thing and show support for a common channel of distribution.  Granted, I am aware of the potential for industry channel friction here.

We Introduced the SWAG Bag:   A SWAG Bag is a promotional item that is handed out to attendees of an event.  Roatan Charter and the Dive Industry Association executed this concept on two of our FAM Trips to Belize and the Turks & Caicos Islands.  We did it for a number of reasons.  Primarily, dive travelers need certain items while on a dive trip in the Caribbean.  Essential items like sunscreen, insect repellent, sunglasses, ball caps, towels, and water bottles, are important to bring for your safety and enjoyment.  We explained to our sponsors that we will be traveling with up to 35 qualified retail buyers for a weeklong trip to the Caribbean.  In addition, we will be spending quality time with buyers from the Dive Resort and Dive Operations.  When you consider how expensive it is to hire sales representatives to cover the Caribbean, having a captive audience with us for a week seemed like a winning proposition to a number of sponsors.  Creating a SWAG Bag for our FAM Trip participants was an enjoyable challenge for us and our efforts were well received by our participants, as well as the resort and dive operation managers.  All the sample products we distributed were used on location and contributed to an enjoyable event.  It may have even led to a few new dealers for the sponsors and a few new vendors for the dive store retailers.

More Improvements and New Ideas:  I am a big fan of integrated marketing campaigns.  I have been a strong supporter of trade and consumer shows and have attended and exhibited at over 50 shows.  I have also assisted with and participated in a number of FAM Trips and on-sight visits of dive resorts, dive operators, and liveaboards.  I have seen the strengths and limitations of each but have been encouraged by things we have been able to bring to the table that has increased the success and effectiveness of our promotions by implementing improvements and new ideas.

When you think about what we are doing by conducting FAM Trips, you see that we are in fact, bringing buyers and sellers together.  But it is not just about travel buyers and sellers.  By integrating our efforts with buyers and sellers of diving equipment, training, travel, and lifestyle products we can open up a whole new concept in dive travel.

For more information on future FAM Trips, contact Gene Muchanski, Executive Director, Dive Industry Association, Inc., 2294 Botanica Circle, West Melbourne, FL.  Phone 321-914-3778. Email: gene@diveindustry.net  web: www.diveindustry.net

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