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Post by tiffany on Oct 6, 2014 17:40:19 GMT
I stopped by my travel agent’s office during my lunch today to get the 2015 Europe & Britain Brochure, and she advised me that Trafalgar has a new brochure out this year for smaller group tours that go to out of the way places. Apparently these tours have a maximum of 26 people. She only had one sample brochure, so she wasn’t able to give it to me, but I’m curious to see what tours they are offering, and how much they are, considering the limited number of people on the tour. Depending on the itinerary and price, I’d be interested in a smaller group tour.
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Post by tiffany on Oct 6, 2014 18:00:35 GMT
I'm also quoted in the Europe and Britain Brochure on page 21. Check it out when you have a chance. |
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Post by Oz-T on Oct 6, 2014 22:01:29 GMT
Just looked at that, Tiffany. Your Portugal quote is in the Australian version of the brochure, so that technically makes you a worldwide author!  |
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Post by Oz-T on Oct 6, 2014 22:19:25 GMT
And looking further, I recognise somebody else's quote.  How do you get quoted? Was this via an online review to Trafalgar's website? * * Slim chance for me if I keep referring to 'Colonel Trafalgar' and his IT gnomes.  |
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Post by chech on Oct 6, 2014 23:25:01 GMT
Yeah, the small group tours include Panama. My tour is said to have no more than 26 and when I spoke to Gavin Tollman, he referred to it as one of their new small group tours. I also know my Japan tour had a maximum of 26 - we had 23. I haven't seen the Europe brochure yet so I don't know where my quote is. My mini-interview thingy is in the South America brochure on page 11. |
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Post by tiffany on Oct 7, 2014 2:03:21 GMT
And looking further, I recognise somebody else's quote. How do you get quoted? Was this via an online review to Trafalgar's website? * * Slim chance for me if I keep referring to 'Colonel Trafalgar' and his IT gnomes. A women from Trafalgar's marketing department emailed me after reading my Portugal tour tale on their forum, asking me if I'd do an interview with her regarding my tour. Since it was too hard to connect on the phone, given the time difference and our schedules, she emailed me a questionnaire to complete. She then emailed me a few weeks later telling me that they would be using one of my quotes in their brochure. I think it's ironic that she found me by using the Trafalgar forum, and yet they closed it. |
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Post by tiffany on Oct 7, 2014 2:06:29 GMT
Just looked at that, Tiffany. Your Portugal quote is in the Australian version of the brochure, so that technically makes you a worldwide author! Nice to know I made it in the Australian brochure. I'm considering this to be my 15 mins of fame! |
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Post by mary on Oct 7, 2014 2:28:16 GMT
I went to a large travel Expo this Saturday and obtained the Europe 2015 brochure. I just looked at it after I saw this thread and Tiffany is in the US edition on age 21. As I've read some of Chech's travel tales linked to her blogs, I think I've figured out which quote is hers. Yay!!
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Post by Oz-T on Oct 7, 2014 2:43:18 GMT
I went to a large travel Expo this Saturday and obtained the Europe 2015 brochure. I just looked at it after I saw this thread and Tiffany is in the US edition on age 21. As I've read some of Chech's travel tales linked to her blogs, I think I've figured out which quote is hers. Yay!! Yep, without even having a cat avatar attached. |
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Post by Oz-T on Oct 7, 2014 2:54:32 GMT
"A women from Trafalgar's marketing department emailed me after reading my Portugal tour tale on their forum, asking me if I'd do an interview with her regarding my tour. Since it was too hard to connect on the phone, given the time difference and our schedules, she emailed me a questionnaire to complete
"
A similar thing happened to me, Tiffany. You were probably communicating with Caroline from Trafalgar's social media section. Like you, I found the time differences difficult but did have a couple of brief phone conversations. They initially wanted to interview me but it all fell apart because they were in the process of shutting down their forum. They tried to work out something where their CEO wanted to discuss a few things with me but I politely told them that I was no longer interested in doing so.
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Post by tiffany on Oct 7, 2014 12:01:03 GMT
"A women from Trafalgar's marketing department emailed me after reading my Portugal tour tale on their forum, asking me if I'd do an interview with her regarding my tour. Since it was too hard to connect on the phone, given the time difference and our schedules, she emailed me a questionnaire to complete
"A similar thing happened to me, Tiffany. You were probably communicating with Caroline from Trafalgar's social media section. Like you, I found the time differences difficult but did have a couple of brief phone conversations. They initially wanted to interview me but it all fell apart because they were in the process of shutting down their forum. They tried to work out something where their CEO wanted to discuss a few things with me but I politely told them that I was no longer interested in doing so. Actually, it was a women named Sarah Wagner who contacted me, and this was done before Trafalgar announced the closure of the forum. When she contacted me again to let me know that I was quoted in the brochure, I mentioned the closure of the forum to her, and she was surprised. She did tell me that she sent my email to their Social and Digital managers, but obviously it didn’t do anything. |
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Post by tiffany on Oct 7, 2014 12:02:17 GMT
I haven’t had time to really look through the brochure yet, but I’m hoping to do so tonight. I’ll have to keep my eye out for Chech’s quote.
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Post by chech on Oct 7, 2014 12:26:18 GMT
A similar thing happened to me, Tiffany. You were probably communicating with Caroline from Trafalgar's social media section. Like you, I found the time differences difficult but did have a couple of brief phone conversations. Yeah, it was Sarah for me too. With only a 2 1/2 hour difference, it was easy and the string and cans aren't stretched as long here, so I could hear her fine. We did the interview for the South America one last winter and spoke again in the spring for the Europe one. She took notes and put together that interview for the South American brochure - which is why it reads a bit disjointedly. (And they wouldn't accept a cat for my photo for that one...lol). And I just sold them a photo of the Osorno volcano.  |
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Post by chech on Oct 7, 2014 12:29:10 GMT
As I've read some of Chech's travel tales linked to her blogs, I think I've figured out which quote is hers. Yay!! Still haven't seen the brochure. Which one do you think is mine? Is it...."oh and if you love cats, you just have to go to Greece! Cute guys? Argentina!" Or was it "Careful about the ATMs in Russia. They look like condemn machines." |
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Post by tiffany on Oct 8, 2014 12:07:21 GMT
As I've read some of Chech's travel tales linked to her blogs, I think I've figured out which quote is hers. Yay!! Still haven't seen the brochure. Which one do you think is mine? Is it...."oh and if you love cats, you just have to go to Greece! Cute guys? Argentina!" Or was it "Careful about the ATMs in Russia. They look like condemn machines." I looked through the brochure last night, but didn’t find your quote. I’ll look again tonight and see if I can find it. |
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Post by californian on Oct 8, 2014 14:52:52 GMT
I saw the brochure on line only, and I saw your quote Tiffany, I should get mine in the mail shortly and I will look for Chech's...Noticed that the price have not gone up this year, at least on a few that I checked, but, in my opinion, the prices should be lower in U$D, since it is becoming strong against the euro, we had that a few years ago and i was hoping we will have it again now, how about in Canadian and Australian dollars?
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Post by chech on Oct 8, 2014 15:03:54 GMT
Ahh..the online brochure. Forgot about that....page 26.  |
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Post by Tulips on Oct 8, 2014 15:41:27 GMT
I just got an email from Trafalgar about sales they are having and Tiffany, you are quoted in the email.
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Post by tiffany on Oct 8, 2014 15:50:14 GMT
I saw the brochure on line only, and I saw your quote Tiffany, I should get mine in the mail shortly and I will look for Chech's...Noticed that the price have not gone up this year, at least on a few that I checked, but, in my opinion, the prices should be lower in U$D, since it is becoming strong against the euro, we had that a few years ago and i was hoping we will have it again now, how about in Canadian and Australian dollars? Hi Californian, the tours I’m interested in have actually gone down in price, although not by much. I did notice that my Switzerland and Austria tour went down by $30.00 Cdn, however, the single supplement went up by $50.00 Cdn, so if you are travelling solo, the tour is actually more expensive this year than it was last year. I also noticed that the Greece tour I’m interested in went down in price by about $200.00 Cdn., however, I can no longer view the single supplement for the 2014 tours online, so I don’t know if the single supplement went up in price or not. The single supplement for the 2015 tour is $995.00 Cdn, which seems high to me, but what can you do. |
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Post by chech on Oct 8, 2014 16:07:34 GMT
I was just flipping through the online brochure and noticed some departures have a 50% off deal on the single supplement. |
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Post by tiffany on Oct 8, 2014 17:39:15 GMT
I just got an email from Trafalgar about sales they are having and Tiffany, you are quoted in the email. I saw that too. I have to admit, I don’t remember that quote though! I’ll have to look over the questionnaire to refresh my memory regarding what I said. |
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Post by mary on Oct 8, 2014 20:31:17 GMT
As I've read some of Chech's travel tales linked to her blogs, I think I've figured out which quote is hers. Yay!! Still haven't seen the brochure. Which one do you think is mine? Is it...."oh and if you love cats, you just have to go to Greece! Cute guys? Argentina!" Or was it "Careful about the ATMs in Russia. They look like condemn machines." "The lack of hassle just pays for itself."
Chech, I've never heard of condemn machines... 
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Post by chech on Oct 8, 2014 21:02:19 GMT
In Saint Petersburg, some of us tried to use the ATM and couldn't figure it out. We got our TD, Diego, and he came out and started killing himself laughing. We were trying to get money from a condom dispensing machine.  PS And yes....I misspelled it condemn again in this post. It's a hormone thing! |
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Post by Oz-T on Oct 8, 2014 21:24:00 GMT
... and the words on the vending machine say: "Made to high Russian standards". So was Chernobyl.... and it leaked too. |
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Post by Oz-T on Oct 8, 2014 21:36:33 GMT
"Actually, it was a women named Sarah Wagner who contacted me"
Yes Tiffany, Sarah was the first person who contacted me too. Sarah is a travel writer for Trafalgar and I think she was planning something based on interviews with several of us. In my case the discussions soon moved to Caroline, then to Katie (Gavin Tollman's PA). I withdrew from the discussions after twice being left waiting for prearranged calls from Gavin that didn't happen. To paraphrase Oscar Wilde, "To be stood up on one phone meeting may be regarded as a misfortune; to be stood up on both looks like carelessness".
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Post by californian on Oct 8, 2014 21:56:37 GMT
Well, Oz-T, I think I stood up Kathy and Mr. Tollman, never responded back to them, I just ignored the email, by then the Forum had disappeared, I was not longer interested in talking with anyone. I have to say Caroline was very helpful, she helped us with some paper work, and that was very nice of her. I think it's their loss, especially because more and more newcomers were joining and asking all kind of questions, it's sad that new travelers now don't have much information before the first trip, and have to learn the hard way, when so much was available before.
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Post by Oz-T on Oct 8, 2014 22:28:57 GMT
Yes, Californian, quite disappointing all around. The three women I had email or phone contact with were fine and efficient. However, I got the impression that Gavin was not a well organised CEO and as a business person myself, I expected a professional style and conduct. When you've rearranged things for a phone meeting and the person who instigated that meeting happens to be on a plane instead, it's rather inconsiderate to not be alerted beforehand. When it happens a second time (waiting three hours for a call that never arrives) you then know that it's not any accident; it's looking like incompetence. I'm a very busy man and I'd be in a mess if I let disorganised people keep wasting my time like that.
The last straw was closing their forum with little warning to the loyal members/customers, and certainly no desire to listen to any feedback. We have lost contact with possibly hundreds of less-frequent members who never got the chance to know that forum was closing. I think Trafalgar lost sight of the fact that its most loyal customers were the ones who were spruiking the brand on their own forum. If I abandoned my own customers/clients I would deserve to see that loyalty disappear. The pity is that this whole thing is a marketing lesson in how not to conduct a business.
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Post by tiffany on Oct 9, 2014 12:36:24 GMT
I just got an email from Trafalgar about sales they are having and Tiffany, you are quoted in the email. I saw that too. I have to admit, I don’t remember that quote though! I’ll have to look over the questionnaire to refresh my memory regarding what I said. I re-read my questionnaire this morning, and found the quote they used in their email, although they cut off part of it. They had asked me if I had travelled with any other tour company, and I said that I had travelled with Insight before but think Trafalgar is better value, and always choose them first unless they are not offering what I’m looking for. They decided to leave the last part of my quote out. |
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Post by mary on Oct 12, 2014 18:01:22 GMT
In Saint Petersburg, some of us tried to use the ATM and couldn't figure it out. We got our TD, Diego, and he came out and started killing himself laughing. We were trying to get money from a condom dispensing machine. PS And yes....I misspelled it condemn again in this post. It's a hormone thing! |
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Post by mary on Oct 12, 2014 18:01:50 GMT
Ok, I now get it, Chech!
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