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others by those who claim superior motives and
tastes who regard themselves as travellers.
travel advisory
GEOFFREY WALL, CANADA
Countries often inform their citizens about unstable
political or social conditions existing in
destinations around the world as a means of
providing safety warnings. These advisories are
not meant to deter travel, although they may have
that effect, but rather to prepare potential tourists
for situations they may not be familiar with and
allow them to take appropriate caution.
travel agency
WILLIAMC.GARTNER,USA
Travel agencies sell inclusive tours, holiday, transportation
tickets and other related products such
as accommodation, car rentals, attraction
tickets and insurance to the public. The suppliers
�or principals as they are often known) of the
products sold may include tour wholesalers or
tour operators, and transportation, car rental
and hotel companies.
A travel agency is an indirect form of distribution
channel in that the agent acts as an
intermediary �or middleman) between the
potential tourists and the suppliers. Such a channel
can be contrasted with a direct distribution
channel, whereby the supplier communicates
directly with the customer. These agents as retailers
act on behalf of their customers in making
arrangements of their choosing with the suppliers.
Legally, however, they operate as an agent of
suppliers, and are paid a commission by them for
sales made. To tourists, the value of using this
facilitation is that agents can offer advice and
recommend the best product to meet their
requirements. For suppliers, they represent a costeffective
distribution channel for their products.
Thomas Cook is credited with being the first
travel agent when, in 1841, having chartered a
train in the United Kingdom to attend a
temperance meeting, he sold the excursion to
the public. Before the Second World War, most
agents predominantly sold ship and rail travel. An
enormous growth in their number has taken place
in the postwar period with the advent of more
leisure time, advances in transportation technology
�particularly jet aircraft) and a wider variety of
wholesaler's products. Agents have developed to
sell an increasing number of tours, often termed
package tours, organised by wholesalers. In so
doing, they are able to pass on the bulk buying
economies generated by the wholesaler to their
retail customers. In many cases, the wholesaler
owns retail travel agents and thus controls both the
production of the package tour and retail
distribution through a process termed vertical
integration.
The travel agency business is becoming more
competitive, and ownership patterns have altered.
Independent agencies owned and managed by an
individual businessman have come under increasing
competitive pressures from large companies
owning multiple travel agency branches and
franchised branches of major touristic companies.
Independent agents have reacted by cooperating
through the pooling of resources in various types
of marketing consortia. Another challenge to be
faced is for travel agents to redefine their role and
business in the face of bookings of air tickets and
hotel bookings, among others, by potential tourists
directly through the Internet, thus bypassing their
services.
Further reading
Travel and Tourism Analyst 601
Brendon, P. �1991) Thomas Cook:150 Years of Popular
Tourism, London: Secker and Warburg. �Traces
the history of Thomas Cook over 150 years.)
NIGEL G. EVANS, UK
Travel and Tourism Analyst
Travel and Tourism Analyst contains studies by authors
with expertise in various facets of tourism operation.
Each issue contains some five reviews on the
transportation sector, outbound market,
market segmentation, accommodation and
leisure markets, and occasional studies. Each