Industrial Distribution

Jack Keough

Travelin’ Man
June 20, 2005

My daughter, Amy, and my son, Tim, just returned from separate business trips. Neither had traveled much in their brief business careers and it certainly opened their eyes to the “joys” of business travel.

“How the heck have you traveled all these years without going crazy?”  Tim asked me during a telephone call from Pennsylvania. Amy, traveling in Canada, basically said the same thing and it brought me back to the days early in my career when I looked forward to traveling.

It was exciting at first. You’d visit a new city, do some calls and make some new business friends. But then there were the lonely nights you’d sit in your hotel room, or have a drink in the lounge where some 20 other businessmen would watch television and occasionally banter with the bartender.

Then there was the rush to make your plane connection, and the delays, cancellations, lost luggage, and ever-present snow and ice storms. I remember one “quick” trip to Dallas where I ended up staying three nights at an airport hotel, praying that the ice storm there would end before the big snowstorm would hit Boston. It didn’t.

The road can wear you down. Today, it’s easy to cancel a trip and instead rely on e-mail. But e-mail can’t replace that personal connection. (Heck, I’ve seen e-mails being exchanged here from one person to his neighbor in an adjoining cube.) One successful salesperson I know had Florida as part of his territory. He didn’t make calls in the winter, like some of his competitors. Instead, he made them in the dreadful summer heat, when he always had an appointment and his clients knew he was there for business and not for improving his golf game. He got a lot of business.

No, travel has never been more difficult. Security measures have caused backups at the nation’s airports and construction projects have caused numerous delays for the road warrior traveling by car, but it’s never been more important to make those person-to-person visits to improve those business relationships.  Otherwise, as a famous United Airlines commercial noted a few years ago, some long-time clients may fire you “because they said they just don’t know us any more.” Don’t let that happen to you.

Posted by Jack Keough on June 20, 2005 | Comments (3)