In case you still have questions, besides, “Where
do I sign?”
Frequently asked questions
Choosing an agency is a significant decision, with serious implications for your career trajectory and your ability to serve your clients. There are many fabulous agencies who cater to different kind of travel advisors. Because we are a selective agency, we will take the time to be sure that we are the right fit for you – and we would encourage you to do the same with us! We have provided answers to some of our most common questions below. If you still have questions, please sign up for one of our office hours sessions, or feel free to send our team an email at any time.
GET ANSWErS ON THE
FOLLOWING TOPICS
General questions
Application process
Onboarding process
training and support
systems and tools
compensation and fees
marketing and branding
network and suppliers
culture
Choosing an agency is a significant decision, with serious implications for your career trajectory and your ability to serve your clients. There are many fabulous agencies who cater to different kind of travel advisors. Because we are a selective agency, we will take the time to be sure that we are the right fit for you – and we would encourage you to do the same with us! We have provided answers to some of our most common questions below. If you still have questions, please sign up for one of our office hours sessions, or feel free to send our team an email at any time.
GET ANSWErS ON THE FOLLOWING TOPICS by clicking the links below
GEneral questions
We have received an outpouring of requests to join our team since starting our agency and have delayed our formal onboarding process until we were certain that we could offer something truly unique and valuable to independent advisors. After years of investing in our proprietary training resources, building an incomparable industry network, and bringing on inspirational leaders, we are confident that we have the best offering in the industry for serious travel advisors looking to grow.
Travel with Awestruck is owned and led by Jenene Mealey, a 16-year travel industry veteran and top-producing advisor with a multi–7-figure book of business. What sets Jenene apart from many agency owners and host agency administrators is her hands-on experience — not just as a leader, but as an active seller of travel. She’s in the trenches daily, navigating the same opportunities and challenges as the advisors on her team. That real-world insight drives the personalized mentorship she provides — from opening her home to train new advisors to offering 1-on-1 sales coaching for seasoned professionals. Before founding Travel with Awestruck, Jenene was an independent contractor with three different agencies, which gave her a deep understanding of what advisors truly need to succeed. She built Travel with Awestruck to raise the standard — creating a transparent, supportive environment where advisors are empowered, commissions are respected, and entrepreneurial freedom is valued. Many of the talented advisors on our team chose Travel with Awestruck for that reason — they were ready for an agency that truly gets it. At Travel with Awestruck, we don’t just sell travel. We shape the industry. And we’re building a team of professionals who want to do the same.
Alexis Berlin serves as Travel with Awestruck’s Chief Growth Officer. She is a Harvard graduate who previously worked as a manager at McKinsey & Company, where she specialized in growth strategy transformations for Fortune 100 organizations. In this role, she coached executives at some of the leading consumer brands in the world on how to grow their businesses. She left her position at McKinsey to join the Travel with Awestruck leadership team because she saw the gap in professional business management in the travel industry and wanted to provide that same growth coaching to travel entrepreneurs who were serious about their businesses – not just booking trips.
We pride ourselves in the diversity of prior work experience on our team, and regardless of your background, we believe there is a place for you at Travel with Awestruck. At Travel with Awestruck, you will find former travel agency owners, stay-at-home-moms, wedding florists, business administrators with advanced degrees, long-time industry veterans, part-time working professionals, and everything in between on our independent advisor team. This diversity in our community means that no matter your question, we have someone who knows the answer – or knows exactly where to look. If you would like to connect with one of our independent advisors to hear more about their experience, please send us a request.
application process
Travel with Awestruck is a selective agency by design. Unlike many agencies, we do not depend on agent fees. Our goal is not to sign up thousands of agents. Our mission is and always has been to empower independent travel advisors to build million-dollar travel businesses. We believe that doing this well requires us to invest deeply in each of our advisors to provide individualized coaching and support – something you cannot do with thousands of independent advisors. This means we need to be selective on who is the right fit for our community to ensure that we can provide you with the right support and environment to live up to our mission. Anything less would be a disservice to you.
No. Our application process is not a formality. We review each application in detail and select the applicants that we believe are a strong fit for the opportunity we are offering. There is not a minimum or maximum number of applicants that we accept in each onboarding cycle.
At the heart of it, we are looking for values-driven professionals with potential. It does not matter how long (or how short) you have been in the travel industry. We are not looking for the highest revenue numbers or the most impressive credentials. We are looking for independent advisors who embody our commitment to put client interests above their own, lead with integrity, and are committed to building their travel businesses, no matter their starting points. We encourage you to check out our Why Travel with Awestruck page if you are looking for more detail on who we are, what we stand for, and what kind of independent advisor is a good fit for our community.
There are many reasons why we choose not to accept independent advisors, including expected fit with our team or simple logistics – we will never onboard more advisors at once than we feel prepared to serve at the highest possible standard.
We encourage you to ask for feedback on your application after decisions are released. We are happy to schedule one-on-one calls to discuss the reason we did not move forward with your application. We encourage you reapply for subsequent cycles if you believe you would be a strong fit after hearing our feedback.
For new-to-industry advisors, applications for this cycle are due on August 30th. Seasoned advisors are welcome to apply on a rolling basis.
Decisions will be announced on September 5th.
Please reach out to our team directly to discuss next steps. We understand that life happens, and we will work with you to be as flexible as possible. For new advisors, we will typically ask that you wait until the next cycle, so we can provide the full onboarding experience. For seasoned advisors, we are open to making exceptions depending upon your circumstances and encourage you to reach out to us at info@travelwithawestruck.com.
Our doors are always open. Please reach out at any time to info@travelwithawestruck.com with your questions. We are happy to schedule time to meet with you.
Onboarding Process
Once you are accepted, we will send you an independent contractor agreement, and you will be asked to pay the annual fee of $499. Please visit the “What we offer” page to learn more about what is included in your annual fee.
Once you have returned your signed agreement and paid the fee, we will begin your formal onboarding. As an independent contractor, the only onboarding you are required to complete is an overview of our systems to get you set up with the right logins and teach you how to use our required tools. We will also offer industry-leading trainings that are fully optional but highly encouraged to help you be successful in the industry.
Our mandatory systems onboarding will take place on Friday, September 26. If you have a hard conflict for this date or concerns regarding the fee process, please do not hesitate to reach out to info@travelwithawestruck.com. As always, we are here to serve and create an environment that supports you.
As soon as your onboarding is completed, you can begin offering your services. You will be added to all team communication channels and have access to the shared resources we provide that have made our independent advisors so successful to date.
Training and support
We have created a custom, proprietary new-to-industry training program that takes you through the full end-to-end process of selling a trip. This training includes over dozens of hours of original and shared supplier content and countless reference materials for you to take away, available on-demand through recorded sessions. We will host a live, guided training to review these materials together during the week of September 29 for those interested.
In addition to our training program, you will be paired with one of our executive leaders as a formal mentor for your first 6 months with Travel with Awestruck. They will host regular sessions to answer any questions you have and be available to support you as you begin booking.
Travel with Awestruck offers a custom, proprietary business building program for new and seasoned advisors looking to accelerate their growth, led by our Harvard-educated, ex-McKinsey Chief Growth Officer. This optional course is one-of-a-kind in our industry, using the same coaching principles that Alexis has deployed with unicorn start-ups and Fortune 100 companies throughout her career, augmented by the travel industry expertise of our owner. Alexis will lead you through a full tear-down and reconstruction of your business, pushing you to reassess your existing value proposition, approach, and standard operating protocols and helping you build a customer strategy to grow faster using the right foundation. Throughout the course, she will also share valuable resources on how to run an exceptional at-scale business, including how to write executive communications, how to deliver a powerful pitch, how to set and measure a growth strategy, and more. All of this is offered at no additional fee to our advisors.(a $1,500+ value).
Beyond this program, Alexis also offers 3 complementary, confidential 30-minute, one-on-one coaching sessions to each of our independent advisors for targeted guidance on the right growth strategy for their businesses (a $750 value).
First, it is timely. Unlike courses built by administrators who are not active sellers of travel, we have custom-built our programs based on the latest trends and information we are seeing as travel advisors ourselves, ensuring that you always have the latest information. We update our training regularly and share live links to the latest content to ensure your resources never go stale.
Second, our training programs are custom and proprietary. We don’t just recycle old supplier trainings – we teach you how to serve clients and grow your business using the same proven methods that have led to double-digit annual growth for our advisors since we were founded.
Finally, we provide continuous coaching and support. There is no one-week “travel academy” that can teach you everything you need to know to serve clients well, but our always-on community discussion channels and mentorship program will be there to fill in the gaps as you go.
We can’t give it all away! What we can tell you is that there are decades of industry knowledge across our independent advisor team, and we have spent years codifying our best practices in one place, so you don’t have to learn the same lessons that we did the hard way. We can’t wait to share it with you.
No (but we promise it is useful). The only mandated training is our systems onboarding. Everything else is fully optional.
Systems and tools
- Professional email account (name@travelwithawestruck.com). If you have your own brand, we do not provide a new email address
- Comprehensive CRM program (VCRM)
- eMarketing platform. This is included if you are doing business as Travel with Awestruck. There is a $100 additional fee if you are not doing business as Travel with Awestruck and have your own brand.
- Direct mail and print magazines delivered to your clients on your behalf
- Proprietary training content library
Compensation and fees
Many of our independent advisors choose to use Travefy to create professional itineraries, proposals, and travel documents for clients. If you would like to use Travefy, there is an additional fee of ~$200 per year to be added to our team's account (where we have created a number of templates, guides, and more to streamline your process). This is entirely optional.
If you are a seasoned advisor, you will start at either 80% or 90% commission automatically, depending on your sales history. Once you reach $1M in annual revenue, you will qualify for 90% commission.
Marketing and branding
You will also have access to our proprietary growth coaching program as well to help you shape and improve your overall marketing and growth strategy.