ASTA

ASTA said is hiring more staff to provide support for its new Premium Travel Agency membership category. Elaborating on ASTA's plan in an interview on Friday, Paul Ruden, senior vice president-legal and industry affairs, said ASTA is hiring another industry affairs staffer, another government affairs staffer, and a web developer. It has already hired research person and is seeking another research staffer. "We'll be increasing size of industry affairs by a third, doubling research, and doubling government affairs," Ruden said. The result will be an increase of 10-11 staff beyond ASTA's current 47-member team. Ruden said ASTA can afford the additional staff since it has substantial equity and a balanced budget for operations.

The Premium Travel Agency membership, which costs $2,500 per year, offers concierge-level business consulting services to agents who sight up. Premium members will have access to a personalized relationship manager (an ASTA staffer), customized research, invitation-only business networking forms and summits, a password-protected website, public relations consulting, and access to ASTA eJournal's professional analysis of issues affecting the retail travel business, among other services.

Ruden said that the new Premium category would not be just an upgraded list of services, but would lead to new learning and research about the agency business through interaction and collaboration between ASTA staff and members. Under the current plan, Premium members will have the opportunity to attend two business summits and one legislative summit over the course of the year. "It will be a chance to talk to their peers about serious business problems," Ruden said.

ASTA also is enhancing its website to enable Premium members to talk to each other through learning communities and bulletin boards. "They will have new and unprecedented opportunities to learn from each other through the association," Ruden said. "It's the learning from each other that makes this a unique and very powerful idea." ASTA has also invested in new software, including a customer relations management program, to help serve Premium members. Twelve people on staff have been designated as relationship managers, each of whom has been assigned a set of specific Premium member agencies. ASTA currently has 59 Premium agency members and has a target of 300 for the year. For more information, call 703-739-8710 or visit .

Frances Kiradjian
818-883-4363