Bailie White got her start in the travel industry as an assistant at a local agency in her hometown of Nashville, and within a year and a half, she was selling travel herself. She loved the work pretty much immediately. Then, when a professional change for her husband took them to Michigan, White decided she was ready to break out on her own. She launched Be The Travel, a luxury travel agency and affiliate of Jetset World Travel, in November of 2018. And things went very well.
“I experienced growth that I wasn’t prepared for, by any stretch of the imagination,” White said. “I needed to bring someone on to help. Instead of an assistant, I hired an independent contractor. I wanted to show someone else what a great industry this is, and how great a career was possible.”
Be The Travel continued to grow at full speed. White brought on contractor after contractor, building a team of 11 within two years. To bring new team members up to speed, she also created an in-house training program designed to help them succeed.
I had big dreams for the company, and I couldn’t unsee them.
The program was a result of her passion for teaching others the business. That passion also came in handy later. White’s business survived a pandemic with grit and determination. But when she had her first child last summer, she found herself at a personal crossroads: If she couldn’t give Be The Travel all the attention and time she felt it deserved, what should she do?
“I had big dreams for the company, and I couldn’t unsee them,” she said. “I played around with a few ideas, wondering how I could make it work as a parent and as the owner of Be the Travel. But it felt like fitting a square peg in a round hole.”
Selling Be the Travel
White eventually decided to sell Be The Travel, and she shared the news with Heather Christopher of Heather Christopher Travel Consulting.
The two were friends, in a very modern sense: They had met on Instagram back in 2017. They grew close rather quickly, connecting regularly over voice text and FaceTime. Having been in the industry since 2006, Christopher wasn’t just White’s friend; she was a professional mentor, too.
Bailie White and Heather Christopher celebrate the acquisition of Be The Travel.
Credit: 2022 ALLYOGRAPHY“Heather is a powerhouse,” White said. “She has always been someone I looked up to in the travel industry.”
Over months and months, the duo bonded over being agency owners and selling travel in the midst of a pandemic. When Bailie had her daughter last summer, they started to talk all things motherhood (Heather has three children, ages 8, 6 and 2). Rarely would a day go by when they didn’t chat.
Then, one day in March, Bailie told Heather — via voice text — that she had decided to sell Be The Travel. Heather reacted immediately.
“I can still picture the road I was on when I got Bailie’s message,” Christopher said. “I went with my gut. I asked her if I could be included in the conversation, if maybe I could buy Be The Travel.”
Heather started her Gettysburg, Penn.-based company, Heather Christopher Travel Consulting, in 2016. Before that, she had worked at a storefront agency for a decade, benefiting from the guidance of beloved mentors and making lifelong friends. Once out on her own, her team grew organically, but slowly. Her book of business, though, is large. Then this unforeseen opportunity landed in her lap.
“It had never been my goal to be a large host agency,” she said. “But [buying Bailie’s company] felt right. If I was going to grow, that was how I was going to do it.”
Heather Christopher Travel Consulting Chosen to Acquire Be The Travel
Despite other offers on the table, White felt that Christopher was the right person to acquire Be The Travel. The two women approached the transaction like the novices they were, bringing in financial and legal advisors to guide the logistics of the sale.
Both brands sell four- and five-star travel and have aligned clientele, making for a seamless transition.
Credit: 2022 ALLYOGRAPHYOne factor of the sale that required special attention was Be The Travel’s valuation. Though many agency sales follow an earn-out model, with the seller receiving an agreed-upon amount of company profits for a set number of years, White hoped to go against the grain. The team instead determined a dollar amount for a clean purchase, with Christopher taking full ownership as of May 1.
“This wasn’t only about money,” White said. “It was even more about who would take care of my girls, who would help them learn and grow. It was very easy to decide that that person was Heather. I know that my stepping down will elevate the team.”
Under Heather’s ownership, Be The Travel will continue to exist, and all its independent contractors (and one in-house travel coordinator) will remain onboard. The companies are essentially merged on the back end, and together they have travel advisors working from Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Massachusetts, Florida, North Carolina, Georgia and Colorado.
Both brands sell four- and five-star luxury travel, Christopher says, making them easy affiliates with aligned clientele.
One of my hopes with this acquisition is that I can take a small step back, and get a little more time for myself and my family. Now I have a team to support that, and I’m excited to help them build their business.
White says that selling her agency as the pandemic waned added an extra emotional layer to the decision; letting go felt a little silly after having weathered such a storm. But she ultimately wanted a sense of balance, right now, that she knew she couldn’t have as an owner.
And there was good news: White would remain part of the Be The Travel crew, acting as the brand’s director of marketing.
“When other people have been in a similar situation, they want to go back to the pieces of the business they love most,” she said. “For me, at the very top of that list is marketing: going after new clients and doing the brand work behind the business.”
Heather was more than happy to have her friend become an official teammate. And she looks forward to better balance for herself, as well.
“Selling is still my favorite part of this work,” Heather said. “It is important to me that I am always connecting with clients. But I have this beautiful book of business — and it’s too big for me. So, one of my hopes with this acquisition is that I can take a small step back, and get a little more time for myself and my family. Now I have a team to support that, and I’m excited to help them build their business.”
