I’m Tom Olinyk.
The date is 1975. Not my birth year, but when I started working for Tauck. Anyone thinking, I wasn’t even born then.
In 1975 I flew from Montreal to LaGuardia to start my first training. Our East Coast tours all left from the Waldorf Astoria Hotel in Manhattan. You need to understand that I had never been in a hotel in my life. Drive up motels, yes, a couple of times. So I wasn’t prepared for what I saw when I walked into the Waldorf Astoria. I was immediately overwhelmed with anxiety thinking what could I possibly have to say to people who stay at a hotel like this. I was within a sliver of fleeing back home. My career almost didn’t happen, but having the courage to make the right decision made all the difference.
My Tauck moment was an event in a foreign country where, due to circumstances, a Travel Warning was issued advising all US citizens to leave the country as soon as it was safe to do so. There were about 5 Tauck tours and maybe 180 guests that were either inside the country or about to enter. We needed to get them out. I know many of you have had your challenges and have your own stories to share.
Without going into great details, the massive co-ordination necessary to move 180 people with only a moment’s notice was other-worldly. Within 24 hours we vacated the country in question to a safe place. Next, each guest was consulted privately and given choices: reroute to another tour, return home or venture out on your own. While no one was happy at the disruption, everyone recognized the efforts Tauck’s head office, air desk, booking desk, TD’s and our suppliers accomplished on their behalf. It was the type of experience that revealed Tauck’s culture: to care, to provide safety and security first and then work out the details.
What I saw happen was a bond created between us and our guests. I see that bond manifested over and over again. I have guests who share their own similar stories saying ‘this is why this is our 12th or 15th Tauck tour’. They trusted us to do the right thing, to make the right decision, and we delivered. As one of the guests on that tour told me at its conclusion, ‘I’ll travel with Tauck anywhere in the world’. Arthur has an adage that expresses it succinctly: ‘Take care of the guests and they will take care of everything else’.
Thank you.