small (but connected) business saturday

Today is Small Business Saturday, where consumers across the country are eschewing the big box stores and enormous online retailers to patronize small businesses. Well, as a small business, we here at Huckleberry Travel say, “Thank you!”

We ran into Jazmine—the owner of another Uniglobe agency—at an event sponsored by the Hungarian National tourism office.

Even though we’re a small, independent travel company — there are only five of us in the business — Tom and David in New York, Erin and Heather on the west coast, and Michelle in the midwest — when you book your travel through our agency, you get a lot more bang for your buck than you might expect. That’s because we’ve invested in some important relationships that give us the tools and resources to make sure our clients get high-touch personalized service, while maximizing value for our clients!

For one thing, we’re part of Uniglobe Travel Center — a network of independent travel agencies, just like ours. Through Uniglobe, we’re able to combine the value of our bookings with the bookings that a few hundred other small businesses make on behalf of their clients. The combined value of those bookings mean that we’re able to get preferred pricing and added amenities from suppliers. And, because the other companies in our Uniglobe family prioritize working with a preferred network of travel suppliers — cruise lines, tour operators, resorts, airlines and hotels — we’ve got some great relationships with companies in that network. If something goes sideways when you’re traveling, we know we can count on those suppliers that are preferred within our network. Even if we don’t book with a particular supplier very often — someone else in our network does, and we can leverage those connections to step in to a well-established relationship when we need help from a supplier.

Our other network is Virtuoso — a consortium of independent agencies and travel suppliers that give us even broader access to amenities, promotions and preferred partner relationships. Through Virtuoso, our clients might get additional onboard spending credits when they sail with one of our cruise partners. Or, at one of the “best of the best” hotels in the Virtuoso hotel program, our clients get VIP Amenities like room upgrades (based on availability), breakfast included, free wi-fi and more.

When it comes to planning travel, supporting a small business like Huckleberry Travel doesn’t mean that our size limits what we can do for you. We can send you almost anywhere, and arrange for you to do pretty much anything (within reason). And all the while, we maximize value, prioritize your safety, and ensure that you’re traveling sustainably. That’s because we’ve invested in important relationships in our industry that benefit our clients.

We may be small. But we’re mighty. So if you’d like to support a small business this holiday season, drop us a line!