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Travelite Packing Tips

November 2000:

Aloha, from finally-getting-chilly Northern California.

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When pigs fly... they fly first class? Officials for US Airways were a bit embarrassed last month when word of a 250-pound pet pig flying in first class (and causing a bit of a ruckus) hit the news. Your pet may be very special to you, but this takes the cake for trying to get around airline rules. I can't decide if the pig's owner is brave or stupid... probably both. Don't forget that airlines have strict rules about taking animals on board, and that you need to make special arrangements at the time you book your flight.

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Some of you have written to ask when I'll be updating the site again, or when you can expect the new issue Travelite online magazine. Friends, it's coming, albeit slowly. I am still playing with my new copy of Macromedia Dreamweaver, and laying out the pages using the Dreamweaver templates I've created. I'm hoping it won't take too long, but in the meantime, I promise to keep these monthly emails coming regularly.

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Now that Halloween is over, stores have gone "whole hog" (pardon the pun) with their holiday decorations. Christmas tree lots have sprouted like mushrooms, and some homes have even started putting up their holiday lights!

Mail-order catalogs, both print and online, are no different. The big race is on to get your e-dollars again this year, and imagine my surprise when I received a printed catalog from Amazon.com in the mail last week.

This past year, with the bust of many dot-com companies have led to fewer players vying for your attention. If you are already on their mailing lists, expect to get lots of email and catalogs from them.

One company that is liquidating its inventory is Mothernature.com, which I spoke about in a recent email to you as one of the online companies that sells the Terra Tints colored lip balm. Mothernature has slashed prices on three colors of Terra Tints. Regularly $3.99, the Blaze (burgundy), Sienna (bronze), and Sunlit (orange) colors are on sale for $2.39. Not a bad price. If you buy a dozen of one color, they still knock off 10% (down to only $2.15 each). Buy them up while they're still in stock, for yourself or as stocking stuffers.

Be aware: When I put in my order through Mothernature.com a few months back, they did not package the lip balm well. The sticks were tossed into a small Priority Mail box without adequate protective packaging or an inner bag, and a couple of tubes fell through the side crack of the box and never reached me! Their customer service was very nice over the phone when I called, but it should have been unnecessary.

Some companies that are thriving in this online catalog environment are those that have long been in the mail-order business. After all, the Web is now just an additional way to order their products, and these folks know all about maintaining inventory, shipping correctly, and handling problems. Both Magellan's (http://www.magellan's.com) and TravelSmith (http://www.travelsmith.com) continue to improve their online catalog. Don't forget that Magellan's has a weekly contest you can enter, AND a live chat capability found almost nowhere else. Just click on the top right graphic where it says "Chat online with Magellan's," and you can have a text-based interactive chat with a customer service rep. This is particularly convenient if you are online through your phone, and don't wish to disconnect to phone them.

L.L. Bean, one of the kings of mail order, has continued to support and promote its Traveler section. Thanks to Mary Rose MacKinnon and Steve Fuller at L.L. Bean, I now have two brand new "Go Anywhere" travel dresses to try out. I will be writing a review of it (with a comparison to Travelsmith's "Indispensable Black Travel Dress") for you in the future.

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Now onto the main tip of the month: ITA Software

Do you use Travelocity, Expedia, Preview Travel, and other travel Web sites to find flight and airfare information? Although you can find various rates for different airlines, most of these sites use a cumbersome interface that takes you a long time to fill out, and a results screen that requires you to scroll through many screens or to deeper sections to get the actual details you want.

If you're like me, you want one screen that *bam!* gives you all the information you want. What's the cheapest airfare? From which airline? How many stops?

There's a new air travel search engine called ITA Software (http://www.itasoftware.com). Developed by computer scientists from MIT, ITA Software allows you to set many of the preferences you're used to, as well as some extra features. ITA Software has come up with such a better mouse trap that it was the search engine selected for the new Orbitz Web site (http://www.orbitz.com), the uber-site being put together by Continental, Delta, Northwest and United. ITA Software is primarily concentrating on a "B2B" business model (business-to-business), but is making its search engine available to the public for free.

You can easily switch from One Way, Round Trip, and Multi-Segment request screens. Better yet, there is a feature that lets you select neighboring airports (from 25 to 300 miles) as well as alternate dates (previous or following). This gives you a flexibility not available with the other reservation sites.

Where ITA Software outshines all of its competition is in the result screen. Split in two, the top half shows you the lowest fares available for all the airlines, while the bottom half displays all the details, including cost, airline, airports, number of stops, departure/arrival dates, take-off and landing time, flight duration, and class of seat. No other reservation search engine gives you as much breadth and choices.

ITA Software gets its information from the same place as everybody else does, and the fares are updated regularly. And since the results you get are only for flights that are available at the rates they are quoting you, you won't see a bunch of flights with great prices, and then find out that these are not available for your time frame.

There is one thing you need to know, though. This is an air travel search engine; this is not a booking/reservation site. If you want to buy the tickets, you need to call the airlines or your travel agent. The really neat part about this is that you are given both the booking code and fare code so the reservation agent can look it up right away.

Take a look at this new search engine, and let me know what you think!

A thank you goes out to JT Goldstone for pointing this new search engine out to me.

That's all for now. Have a wonderful autumn season!

-- Lani

Travelite Packing Tips

November 2000:

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