About Rick Fisher:
Rick Fisher is the President of Vacation Home Expo - the travel industry’s first and only consumer travel show solely focused on the condominium, villa, and vacation home rental segments. Prior to co- founding Vacation Home Expos, Rick was a Vice President for Expedia’s Specialty Lodging division which included vacation rentals and bed and breakfast. He has been a visible spokesperson and strong advocate for the vacation rental category for the last twenty years.


Q: The industry is excited to see the launch of the Vacation Home Expo. How did you go from working at Expedia to launching the Vacation Home Expo?

Although I came from the leading online provider for vacation rentals in Expedia I have always felt that the opportunity to create more awareness of the growth and popularity of vacation rentals with consumers and the media was via offline exposure. It’s very simple…we believe that approximately 85% of North Americans have never stayed in vacation rental type accommodations and have only experienced a traditional hotel stay .Most of the focus in our industry has been on pushing out product to the market place via the internet. Along the way there’s been very little commitment from our sector to do more in creating more offline awareness with consumers, the media, and travel trade about the benefits of the “vacation rental experience”. Vacation Home Expo represents the ideal venue to help contribute to that needed effort. The fact that the Expo in Atlanta is being endorsed and presented by the Atlanta Journal Constitution also lends a tremendous amount of credibility to our category.


Q: The first Expo is in Atlanta this coming April. Is this an annual event or can we expect to see additional showcases in other major cities in 2008?

Our intent is to make the Atlanta show an annual event and we are already exploring dates for 2009 and beyond. Our plans are also to expand the Vacation Home Expo to other key cities and markets around the country. We have just formed an industry Advisory Council comprised of seasoned executives representing a broad cross section of the vacation rental space. One of the assigned tasks of the council will be to provide us with critical feedback regarding future potential venues as well as other ideas and recommendations that will position the Expo for continued growth and success.


Q: How will you measure the success of the Vacation Home Expo?

That’s a great question and for me it won’t be based simply on numbers that can be easily quantified like the total of consumer attendees to the show and the final tally of exhibitors. Instead, I envision the Vacation Home Expo as a step by step process that will be instrumental in introducing more consumers to this phenomenal accommodation lifestyle. Anyone will tell you that, like cruising, vacation rentals reflect a high level of consumer satisfaction and the propensity for strong repeat and referral business. The challenge has always been and still exists today to attract new customers who will experience this lodging option for the first time. As I’ve always said once you taken them to “the promised land” you will most likely have a believer and convert for life. Our hope is to have the Vacation Home Expo act as a key catalyst to rally an already diverse and fragmented industry around this common cause and purpose. In addition to servicing the needs and interests of existing vacation home renters true success will come with our ability to touch that tremendous untapped pool of new customers and further grow the category.


Q: Between the various VRMA events, RezFest and other industry association events, it seems like there is an opportunity to migrate supplier focused conferences into hybrid events that focus on property management and industry awareness. For instance, in New Orleans there could have been a day dedicated to exhibiting property managers and vacation travel services to consumers. Are there discussions with VRMA or other associations to create this type of partnership?

At Vacation Home Expo we believe that we need to remain inclusive which translates into getting more of our industry association partners and representatives from the supply community to join us in getting our messaging out to the market place. Too often we meet and exchange ideas amongst ourselves while consumers, the media, and travel trade are left on the outside looking in. We have already considered the concept of potentially co-locating future shows around association conferences or vise versa. This would result in not only creating more industry awareness but also maximize participation by consumers and suppliers alike.


Q: You live in Connecticut, a state notoriously split between the Yankees and Red Sox. FlipKey is not shy about its love of the Red Sox… Who’s your team?

Although I’m from Michigan I grew up with Mantle, Maris, Ford, and have always been a hard core New York Yankees fan and supporter. At the time of this interview there’s not too much to celebrate but as they always say … “There’s always next year”.

This entry was posted on Monday, October 22nd, 2007 at 2:55 pm and is filed under Community, Interviews. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.