(Way back) #ThrowbackThursday with Nolan Burris

Nolan Burris, self-described flea market fanatic, was at a sale one day and found a business card belonging to one Penelope Dunswoody Smythe, professional consultant and proprietor of Cheshire Travel Advisors, which Burris estimates to be from between 1900-1910. Below, he shares his thoughts on what the advisors of today could learn from their counterparts of yesteryear.

Before 1931, there were no ‘travel agents.' In fact, Penelope would probably have slapped you if you’d called her that.

An agent is by definition a sales representative, and old Penelope didn’t earn commissions (the first dollar of commission wasn't paid out until 1931) or even make reservations. Consultancy professionals like Penelope were paid for one thing and one thing only: to provide guidance.

You see, the world of travel was very different in Penelope’s day. Instead of cruises, there were steamships, which weren’t meant for vacation, but for weeks-long travel between continents. Instead of commercial flights there was rail travel, with a whole network of stops and connections and stations that needed to be mastered.

In lieu of webinars and FAMs, product knowledge took the form of personal investment, where pros like Penelope invested their personal time into travel so they could familiarize themselves with what was available – all so they could provide advice to their clients, who had no other way of knowing what train to take or what steamship company had the best cabin for their trip across the Atlantic.

Further to that, tradeshows didn’t exist, so in order to network with suppliers, Penelope would have had to travel in order to meet them herself, or else make connections with friends of friends (known today as a ‘friend request’). Phones were also scarce, so first-hand information on the ins and outs of travel was in high demand.

In short, everything Penelope did required a lot of work. She was the holder of firsthand knowledge; the original TripAdvisor. And because she managed to obtain information that was only available to a handful of people at the time, she was able to make a living simply sharing it with others. No commission required.

In today’s world, it’s not unheard of for commission rates to be lowered; it actually seems to be happening more and more. With that in mind, who is to say that commissions will be around forever? We should know better than to pretend otherwise.

A smart business does not put their financial future into the hands of a disinterested party. Even if you love your supplier and your rep, they are not the board of directors; they don’t make the rules. Commission is a fabulous arrangement, and it’s what suppliers used to say, ‘Thanks for what you did for the company’. A fee is what your clients used to say, ‘Thanks for what you did for me’.

Penelope charged the fees she did because a lack of information in the travel world made her valuable. Today, the opposite is true, and it creates that same value. Information is everywhere, but it creates the same problem, and makes people want to seek out the ‘right’ information.