Meet Becky who joined a year ago and is the latest consultant to win our Money-Back Challenge and get her Elite franchise fee – £14,995 – refunded!
Any Elite franchisee who enters the Challenge is tasked with earning a set amount of commission in the first year, and Becky achieved it even though she had never worked in the travel industry before she joined us.
“It’s a little bit surreal to be honest. I’m quite shocked that I’ve done it and obviously pleased…When I joined, I paid my franchise fee and I just thought that was gone.
“For the first few months, I never expected in my wildest dreams to actually meet that target. And then everybody was talking about Peaks… the January, February, March period when loads of people come to you to book holidays.”
Becky says she was quite despondent when she didn’t receive the sort of bookings some of our agents take in the peak January season (some consultants took £100-£500k in bookings in 2023).
“But what I was doing was really working on trips with people. And then suddenly at the end of March, beginning of April, they all started coming to fruition. And then it was like, actually, I could quite easily meet this challenge if it carries on like this. And it did. You get out of it, what you put in. There’s been a lot of hard work. It’s not easy.”
So what is Becky going to spend the refund on?
“I’m going to spend it on a couple of bottles of champagne probably and holidays! Travel is my passion, it’s what I spend my money on, so that’s what I’ll be doing.”
Becky is a seasoned traveller (her honeymoon was a four-month expedition around South America) but although she had a passion for travel, she did not know she could become a home based travel consultant until she met someone who told her about the opportunity.
“In my previous life, I was a self-employed business analyst for the last 20 years. I liked it, but I didn’t love it. I’ve always traveled and I didn’t think you could do something like this. Somebody mentioned you could. So I started Googling and found Not Just Travel.”
So is Becky happy she took the leap?
“Yes, I love it. It’s been a steep learning curve. There’s been ups and downs, but I love it. I’ve experienced so much of the world, although so little as well. And if I can get other people to do that and enjoy it, then I’m happy really.”
Like many consultants, Becky was worried she would be on her own and wouldn’t know how to book certain holidays in parts of the world she had never visited. But she says it’s not been a problem and she’s booking everything from Bali and the Maldives to family holidays to Croatia.
“I was very scared about having my own business, but you’ve got access to so many suppliers and people including Business Development Managers (BDMs) that I can ask.”
Becky says the BDMs were a huge help.
“They’re brilliant. I think the one thing that made me decide to join Not Just Travel was the support you get. The BDMs are on call for you whenever you’ve got queries with bookings or who’s the best supplier for a certain location.”
She also found the ops team an incredible asset.
“If you get a problem with the systems or any of the bookings, then I’m on the phone to them. They help me sort it out, escalating it where needed.
“We’re doing the fun stuff, finding the holiday and booking the holiday, but then all the ticketing, the paperwork, the admin side, is all done by head office.”
Becky was also relieved to discover finding customers wasn’t a problem, especially as she finds phoning people, networking and posting on social media hard work!
“Actually it hasn’t been that difficult. A lot of word of mouth. I’ve asked a lot of friends to refer me to people, share my posts on social media. I’ve joined a couple of networking groups. And just slowly people have, you know, picked the phone up and called me and, or sent me a message.”
And of course, the big perk about this job is that she can pursue her passion for travel.
She’s got her eye on a trip to Costa Rica and returning to Vietnam, and she’s also booked Greece in September and Lapland in January. She’s also going on one of our company mentorship retreats abroad: our Elite Experience to a long-haul exotic ‘secret’ destination in November.
“I’m really looking forward to that and can’t wait to find out where it will be! The last one was in Mauritius but I’m secretly hoping it will be in Mexico!”
We’ll let you know soon Becky! In the meantime: Congratulations!
