Gratitude is a great word! The definition is: the quality of being thankful; readiness to show appreciation for and to return kindness. It is a word that everyone should think of often, one that shares positive insights no matter whether there are difficulties, disappointments, or elation. We can have gratitude in a good day or a bad day.

Must Love Travel is a company of gratitude. We are not the originators of course, we adopted this as a company value after attending a conference organized by one of the suppliers we work with, The Mark Travel Corporation. Conferences can be long, tiring and exciting, but this conference was more than that. Gratitude permeated throughout each session, each dinner, each event and left us with a strong “we can do this” attitude and one we wanted to bring to our company.

We start each meeting with gratitude statements and anyone can participate along with the management team. It doesn’t have to be work related, it can be personal as well. We consider our team a family and care deeply about their lives, both at work and home. We are a team of encouragers. It is always hard to see team members go through difficult times and is much easier celebrating success, but either way we share gratitude.

One of our travel planners shared this week, how a difficult client who was unkind during a rather difficult booking, lead her to gratitude. Grateful for the learning experiences she came away with, she now has a new perspective on situations that may be similar in the future. We have all encountered people like this, and in any industry that serves people you will find the majority grateful, but always have those few that bring the challenge to the table. Staying firm, steady the course, act kind and always be in gratitude helps those few situations disappear rather quickly.

This isn’t really a travel article, but a personal insight into something that moves us everyday and allows us to work closely with our clients, suppliers and each other. We are truly grateful for all the people we serve while planning and booking their vacations. Being in business for over 22 years we have met many people and each one has impacted us in some way. Many have become lifelong friends. We are grateful for our supplier partners that we have the privilege to send our clients to on their vacations, weddings and other celebrations. We are grateful for our travel planners and support staff that work diligently to service their clients. The job is not an easy one and we know that they would not be here if they couldn’t say, “I Love My Job”. And we know they do.

I hope you can experience gratitude everyday!