O'Neill Named Maritz Prez of Corp. Travel

<B>O'Neill Named Maritz Prez of Corp. Travel</B>

Maritz Travel Co. has bolstered its corporate travel division by introducing new senior management positions, fronted by Jack O'Neill who will serve as president of corporate travel.

With Maritz since 1987 as corporate vice president for airline partnerships and marketing services, O'Neill previously worked with customers to negotiate airline contracts, business pricing and operating models, as well as spearhead marketing initiatives. "I have been pretty close to most of our clients for some time so I will be able to provide some management consistency for our clients and field officers," he said.

"Jack just gets it," said Jeff Reinberg, who will succeed Michael Boland as president and CEO of Maritz Travel Co. on April 1. "He has an understanding of how the travel industry has fundamentally changed and how the requirements of managing our customers are different." O'Neill will report directly to Reinberg, who earlier this year had addressed the need to create this new position (<I>BTN</I>, Jan. 10) to give dedicated management to the corporate area of the Maritz business. "We have created two new positions giving a one-two punch to run our corporate travel division," said Reinberg. "Our corporate travel division by itself is $1 billion in sales and is staffed by 1,500 people."

Mike Koetting will assume the second newly created position: senior vice president of corporate travel. Koetting previously was general manager and vice president of the Western area and also worked closely on an internal project with corporate client Boston-based Bain & Co., a global strategy consultancy, to come up with a set of objectives and strategic goals.

O'Neill said emphasis will be on enhancing corporate customer relationships. "It's past providing quality service," he said, "it's about having high client relationships which is a challenge for all big travel companies."

Reinberg stressed the challenge posed by industry newcomers who have taken advantage of opportunities created by the Web. Newcomers will assert that with their small size they can be more attentive to clients, "but what they fail to say is they don't have the resources, the technology, the supplier relationships that Maritz has," he said.

O'Neill hopes to increase client awareness of Martiz's suite of Web-based products, called eCom Solutions, to offer time and cost savings to corporate clients. "We have to help our clients take advantage of the Web," said O'Neill, "because it is an increasingly important part of our business.