About Cruise Brothers
CruiseBrothers.com is one of the largest family owned cruise agencies in the country. We’ve been in business since 1972 – that’s over 35 years of experience as cruise brokers – specializing in all aspects of cruising, making us YOUR experts on the cruise lines, the ships, and the destinations. Our success stems from our well-trained international network of expert cruise agents and our award winning customer service department.
Year after year, Cruise Brothers consistently ranks among the top producers with Royal Caribbean, Princess, Norwegian, Celebrity and Carnival allowing us to offer the best prices available. We are long time members of CLIA and an Ensemble Preferred Cruise Agency.
STEVE, President and CEO of Cruise Brothers, adds his vast knowledge and love of the cruise industry along with his extensive marketing experience – making him a well-respected visionary in the industry. Over the years, Steve has been on every new ship as a guest of Captains and Cruise Line Executives.
RUSS, the other Brother, has recently taken a step back from the day to day operation of the business, however his vision and enthusiasm remain with us.
Cruising Free Overview
A Cruising Free! associate sells cruise and land vacation travel packages to their friends, family, business associates, and anyone else who contacts you with a desire to experience either cruise or land vacation travel. The Cruising Free! associate works from their home (or another preferred place of business) and performs all the tasks necessary to sell cruise and land (tours) travel just as if they were sitting at the office.
There are five (5) very general steps that are involved in selling vacation travel. They are:
– Perform marketing and advertising using contacts, flyers, business cards, telephone calls, etc such that prospective clients contact you wishing to purchase vacation travel.
– You then use industry specific online tools to find a cruise or land vacation that best suits the customers desire. Note that we provide free training for all online tools required.
– Upon customer agreement, you then formally book the cruise or land package with the appropriate cruise line or tour operator. This can be done by any of the following means.
– o – Using online computer based cruise booking tools. These tools may include cruise line specific websites and/or online global distribution systems (consolidated reservation systems).
– o – Calling the Cruise Line or Tour Operator directly via telephone giving the representative all pertinent information necessary to book the cruise.
– o – Contacting our Cruising Free! support department directly where we will then book the cruise or land vacation for you on behalf of your client. Note that you still will earn the commission!
– After booking the cruise or land vacation, and throughout the lifecycle of the booking (the time from booking to when the customer actually travels), you will monitor the booking for any issues that may arise. Note: We actually do this for you but it never hurts to have additional quality assurance.
– And finally, when the customer embarks upon their cruise or land vacation, you will receive payment from us via check in an amount commensurate with the agent’s share of the commissionable amount earned for booking the vacation product. For more on this, please see the section Getting Paid
Business Cards
As a Cruising Free! associate, you should get business cards. We have a business card provider that we recommend you contact. It is Vista Print. We have a template file we can send over to you such that you can give this file to your business card provider.
Training And Support
WE WON’T LEAVE YOU OUT IN THE COLD! Professional development is critical to being a successful Cruising Free! associate. We offer online training at homecruiseagent.com as well as a whole host of information which serves to increase your knowledgebase. We have training articles, marketing articles, specials, hot deals, webex training videos, announcements, and more.
In addition to our extensive online support, we also offer incredible “real world” training. As a Cruising Free! associate, you will have opportunities to experience Cruise Ship travel through agent familiarization trips and seminars at sea. Did you know that Cruise Lines want you to travel so that you can experience their product directly. Studies have shown that this makes for more qualified travel professionals.
Furthermore, if you need any assistance whatsoever, our Cruising Free! support department is there to answer any questions which may arise. Being a Cruising Free! associate means being engaged…which only serves to increase your knowledge and in turn, your sales.