16. A FUNNY LIFE

AT 75:  STILL CRAZY AFTER ALL THESE YEARS

After that big career jump in 1962, life turned very interesting.  I won't bore you with an entire curricula vitae of dates, companies, titles, and job duties.  Instead, how about some of the funny things that happened in each?

RETAIL TRAVEL IN NEW YORK:

After going through the nightmare of that airline experience, I took the first job that was immediately available - working as an international travel consultant at an agency in New York City.  It was easy, fun, and stress-free.  The owner of that agency was the daughter of one of the CEOs of a huge entertainment company.  She was never there so it was up to me to handle travel plans for "Daddy's people".  This meant I was planning vacation trips for celebrities and their 'escorts' to exotic (and discreet) locations worldwide.

LEARNING MARKETING FROM CALL GIRLS

Yes, I saw a lot of famous names come through that office.  More importantly, I met a lot of their 'escorts' who would be sent in to make arrangements for all sorts of special requirements such as "satin sheets, fresh flowers daily, and no green M&Ms in the candy bowl".  I was amazed by many of these ladies.  First and foremost, they were business women, well educated, beautifully dressed, articulate, and pragmatic.

I spent a lot of time working on trips for "Suzanne" and her showbiz clients.  I found out she had graduated from Vassar several years earlier with a B.A. in Art History and no job openings for art historians.  Like most women in her early twenties, her upper-middle-class parents expected her to get a suitable husband or work as an assistant editor at some publication for $70. a week.

What Suzanne wanted, however, was to make a lot of money as quickly as possible and then buy her own art gallery.  She was attractive but not beautiful;  never looked like a hooker at all.  Nothing cheap or flashy about this gal - she was perfectly groomed, soft-spoken, and highly intelligent.  We spent a lot of time talking about her work because she was encouraging me to try it.  She said that sex was only a small part of escort work.  What her patrons wanted was someone who looked like a 'lady', was presentable in public and could carry on an intelligent conversation.

She said she considered herself a 'courtesan' in the historic sense of the word.

FANTASY IS THE KEY

She taught me that men are 'easy'.  She said that a woman who really understood men could have any man she wanted. The obvious strategy was making him feel good about himself and that he was better, stronger, and more powerful when he was with her.  Stroking the ego was more important than stroking anything else.  Never talk about his latest film that bombed at the box office (unless he brings it up in conversation).  Instead, steer the conversation to the time he was nominated for an Oscar.  And LISTEN.  Men love to talk, not listen.  Ask open-ended questions, listen intently, and watch with rapt attention.

Then, if you wanted him to gain a long-term client, dig out his fantasy.  Find out what he has secretly hidden away from everyone, including his wives, and make it happen for him.  If, for example, his secret wish is to wear ladies lingerie, take him shopping and help him select the items that will make him look the most 'attractive'.  

THE BIG STRATEGY

Suzanne told me it was like selling a painting.   He was spending his discretionary dollars on an intangible luxury:  an experience, a memory, a reward to himself.  And the buying decision was based on emotion, not on logic.  That was what marketers often overlooked - how do you present a product in a way that it is so irresistible that the customer will do anything to get it.  If that was not the motivation behind most purchases,  

I took those insights and put them together with everything I had learned in psych courses in college plus business experiences in New York and came up with my own version of "How to Market Intangible Luxuries" - which is exactly what leisure travel is!  I rode that pony into fame and fortune writing articles for magazines, teaching college courses, giving speeches all over the world, and consulting for governments that wanted to attract tourism.

I became known worldwide as the leading expert on "experience based travel" subdivided into soft adventure, hard adventure, and special interest travel with subsets such as ecotourism.