Legacy VTS Shifts To Be Online Directravel

Mahwah, N.J.-based VTS Travel last month changed its name to Directravel and unveiled a new Web site and online booking tool, as officials expect more than half of its bookings to be made online by 2011.

The TMC during the past 10 years has acquired several travel management companies in regions ranging from New York to Illinois and the different names and corporate cultures of each company provided Directravel with the perfect opportunity to rebrand, said Vince Vitti, Directravel CEO. "We were looking at the evolution of brick-and-mortar travel agencies to more automated Internet-based travel and we wanted a more clear definition in terms of how we saw the future," he said. "We've put a much stronger focus on automation than we have seen in past years, but with a continued blend of people skills that are very necessary in the travel market."

A stronger focus on the Internet is not completely out of Directravel's character, Vitti noted, as the company in the past placed a heavy emphasis on automation to clients. Meanwhile, Vitti will look to increase Internet bookings from 15 percent to 25 percent during the next 18 months. "We'll be inverting our booking patterns," he said. "We expect in three years that 15 percent will move to 40 percent of our trips and in five years, the majority."

Directravel's market focus remains on the small and midmarket. Vitti said "there are lots of companies that we'll continue to knock heads with. Folks have a choice: Do they want an automation company acting as a travel agent, or do they want a company with a long travel history handling the automation needs?"

For Vitti, Directravel's advantage in the small and midmarket over the likes of Travelocity Business lies in the company's three online booking tool offerings, which are of various levels of price and complexity. The newest addition is Travelport's booking tool, rebranded as DirectLink for Directravel. The company also uses Cliqbook's tool in a similar fashion as DirectLink Plus. Finally, there is DirectLink Express, Directravel's homegrown booking tool, which offers the most basic of such capabilities as fare schedules and comparisons and air, hotel and car rental reservations. "We've been working on it for a good number of years and we developed most of the software while we were in another business," Vitti said. "For about seven years, we were in the Internet hotel reservation business, under the banner 1800USAHotels.com. We sold that company last year to Cendant, but we did retain the expertise and ability to manipulate reservations on the Internet."

Vitti sees his company landing clients with more complex travel needs, rather than those looking for automation alone. "We'll continue to see a good percentage of trips, with the exception of more complex transactions handled with the assistance of experts who add value to the transaction," he said. "By utilizing the tools that we have with our people resources, we think we're a much better choice for someone who has complex travel needs."

Patricia Rivera, national director of meetings and travel for the New York-based Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation, has been a client for the past five years. A user of DirectLink Plus, Rivera is optimistic the TMC's online moves will continue to help her cut costs in the nonprofit's travel program, which she said claims an annual spend of just under $2 million.

"We are definitely—especially as a nonprofit charitable organization—always looking to save money where we can," Rivera said. "We adopted the online system two years ago this month and we managed to save quite an amazing amount of money going online. We have about 50 percent of travelers online booking travel and it's saved us hundreds of thousands of dollars in the last two years."