Criteria in Travel Design
and the Essentials to Focus on
Travel Design
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Chapter Three
Criteria
..and here we come to the heart of the matter: I’ve never left Istanbul, never left the houses, streets, and the neighborhoods of my childhood.
Orhan Pamuk, Memoirs of the City
The dynamics of demand and supply in travel industry have unrecognizably changed. For one thing, the former 'hierarchy' in the chain no longer exists. In today's IT-driven world, even the suppliers can deal directly with the end-customer.
What then is a DMC selling? How exactly now can a ground operator create value for a tour operating business, i.e. 'the client'?
Much consideration is necessary in governing the concept of quality: Creativity, proactive thinking, dynamism, an unrivalled knowledge of the market and a grasp of what travelers demand from an exploration of the destination are great assets for any company, but they are no longer enough. We must bring magic into the scene.
We must be what all others aspire to become.
Dolunay is unique in having been structured for B2B service. It is our conviction that the interests of the client must be prioritized before all things in order for us to validate our being in service.
We consider ourselves strategic partners and solution providers maintaining the highest standards in the industry.
In this picture:
Reflections of Paradise
Above: Gardens of Eden on the Dome of Hasan Mosque in Isfahan
Below: Tulip gardens of Istanbul during the Tulip festival in April. The Tulip originates in istanbul.
We appreciate the pressures of a competitive market in sales, and understand that competitive pricing is the utmost necessity in the industry today. It is also difficult to compete against apps and .com’s. We also understand there are many other parameters, subtleties to be concerned with.
After all, ‘it is the journey, not only the destination.’ It is actually taking a bath as the locals do, not just seeing the bathhouse.
Our job is to know which bath house, what day of the week, when in the day and so on; it is to know intuitively the right answer for each individual guest before they ask. Our job is the whole page, not just the sentence.
The cliché “Turkey is an open air museum” ignores the fact real people also live here and struggle with the vicissitudes of living on a day by day basis.
The unique thing about Turkey is that those everyday lives are lived out on a stage that is more than ten thousand years old.
When one notices a stone-age motif on a modern carpet - time compressed into an instant, the realization of this historical context turns to fascination.
Unraveling this vital chord that links present time and place to the past is a form of studying our own selves, and it is this level of experience that we strive to bring to our guests’ experience.
For example, if the rose-garden cafes of Edirne are now the nearest equivalent to the sultans’ private paradises, so the stunningly sumptuous bright walls of tile of Ottoman creation survive in peasant houses’ violet colored glass tumblers and brooms with bristles dyed pink, turquoise and green.
The ancient grape harvest celebrated in Dionysian festivals when the laborers pressed the grapes with their knees is still alive when the provincial Turks dance with their knees touching on the ground in any wedding party.
Dolunay would be perfect match for the travelers, whether individuals, large multi-generation families or groups, who appreciate the value of travel and seeking a memorable experience rather than checking places off on their ‘been-there-don-that’ list.