Who is Gohagan & Company?
For over 40 years, Gohagan & Company has been creating innovative, small-group, affinity travel programs for intellectually curious and discerning travelers. Our trips are focused on education and culture, carefully curated to delight the mind and ensure that the experience is a comprehensive one. We offer luxury land and cruise itineraries developed by a team of experts who bring decades of experience in planning travel programs around the globe. With deep relationships worldwide and a hard-working, travel-loving team, we continuously reimagine and deliver top quality experiences that our travelers will remember for a lifetime.
Job Summary
Gohagan & Company is seeking to add a Product Manager to our team. The Product Manager will be responsible for the design, preparation, and implementation of all tour elements and components involved in creating and operating each tour series. Product Managers are each charged with all matters pertaining to the product enhancements and tour feedback from Operations, Travel Directors, guests (Quality Reports) and internal staff for a select group of assigned tours. Product Managers should have an excellent understanding of the Gohagan product standards and ensure their tours are compliant.
Product Managers are responsible for meeting and/or exceeding the Cost of Sales and Margin goals set for the series. Product Managers are responsible for creating and executing tour budgets including breakeven analysis. Product Managers work closely with the hotels, ship and Destination Management Companies for their programs. They further work to obtain the best possible value for guests by creating bids from suppliers and identifying alternative opportunities.
Product Managers work closely with the Program Operations, Marketing, Sales, Passengers Sales, and Passenger Service teams to maintain an awareness and understanding of the program series.
In addition, Product Managers are expected to respond to questions as they are presented by both internal sources (Operations, Marketing, Travel Directors, Presales, and management) and external sources (guests and suppliers.) Product Managers must be willing and able to travel, and such travel may provide little or no advance warning and may occur over weekends and/or holidays.
Essential Job Functions:
· Successfully contribute to the research, design, development, maintenance, enhancement, organization, communication, and budgeting/costing of current products and new product opportunities for assigned programs/regions. This includes initial development and incorporation of continuous improvement in all itinerary revisions and accordingly reporting such changes to a broader audience.
· Successfully maintain and enhance all assigned programs/regions with respect to itineraries, cost-of-sale management, quality control, customer service, and identify new/unique opportunities exclusive to Gohagan and Company.
· Engage in frequent correspondence and follow-up with cruise lines, hotels, ground suppliers, and Travel Directors for maintaining superior supplier relations
· Ensure responsive and effective acknowledgement of guest input, ideas, and concerns.
· Successfully negotiate supplier components for assigned tours/regions. This includes completing Letters of Agreement to ships, hotels, DMCs and other suppliers and preparing initial deposit requests.
· Manage creation, maintenance and execution of date sheets and itineraries for assigned programs.
· Manage creation, maintenance, and execution of budgets for each of the assigned tours. This includes creating and regularly updating tour budgets with accurate costs. Monitor budget variances regularly. This also includes negotiation and finalizing rates, terms & conditions with suppliers.
· Develop any optional tours and extensions date sheets, budgets, and itineraries.
· With speed and accuracy, ensure delivery of appropriate information to all internal constituents including Pre-Sales, Marketing, Sales, and Accounting.
· Oversee assigned supplier contracts using Gohagan Standard Forms and integrate into internal requirements including Program Briefings.
· Maintain thorough awareness of company competitors and their product offerings, including where necessary, competitive analyses.
· Attend Pre-Creative and Creative product meetings.
· Proof program proposals, brochure, catalog and pre-trip passenger information copy.
· Review website program details and photos for assigned programs.
· Set up and present Program Briefings.
· Review Travel Director Trip Reports and follow up with vendors on problems noted in report.
· Handle extra responsibilities with special itineraries within programs.
· Successfully contribute to the research, design, development, maintenance, enhancement, organization, communication and budgeting/costing for Custom Groups and Incentive programs. This includes the preparation of the program proposal and updating based on Sales input and incorporation of the changes to all itinerary revisions and accordingly reporting changes for the broader audience.
What you bring:
· Bachelor's degree (B. A.) from a four-year college or university.
· Minimum 3-5 years of experience creating and/or planning cruise and/or other international travel programs required.
· To perform this job successfully, an individual should have knowledge of Microsoft Office, specifically Excel, Word, and PowerPoint.
· Excellent negotiating and communication skills.
· Excellent General knowledge of destinations and geography.
· Management of large-scale projects.
· Ability to travel Internationally on short notice.
· This position is located in our Chicago Headquarters office.
Special Requirements:
· Must maintain a valid passport.
· Willingness to travel occasionally (domestically and/or internationally) for trade shows, product contracting, planning and destination familiarization and/or group operation.
What you can expect:
- Work with talented and diverse individuals who are passionate about world travel, geography, history, and culture.
- Join a purpose-driven company committed to creating lifelong bucket-list tour experiences for our travelers.
- Work-life balance is important to us, and we want our associates to have balanced lives, so we offer remote working arrangements for positions that can be effectively performed remotely.
Personal Characteristics:
- A self-starter, confident in your abilities, self-motivated and able to work effectively with little supervision.
- A high-energy, results-oriented individual who can make a difference; an individual who takes the initiative, makes things happen, accepts accountability, and has a "can do" attitude; has a sense of urgency.
- Solid business acumen with qualitative and quantitative analytical skills.
- Creative and flexible in attitude and style to adapt to new situations in a rapidly changing, dynamic environment.
- Desire to work for a growing company.
- A strong value system, unquestioned integrity, and good listening skills.
- Ability to thrive in a team environment.
Benefits:
Gohagan & Company works hard to embrace diversity and inclusion and encourages everyone to bring their authentic selves to work every day. We offer a variety of benefits to our associates:
- Retirement Plan with Company Match
- Medical, Dental, and Vision Coverage
- Ancillary Benefits (Disability, Accident, Critical Illness, Hospital Indemnity, etc.)
- Life Insurance
- Paid Time Off and Sick Leave
- Career growth and development
- Eligible associates will be offered an exploratory business trip during their first year of employment to experience the Company product.
- Family and Friends discount - have those close to you experience the unique and exciting bucket-list company tours.
Compensation:
The salary for our roles depends on circumstances, including an applicant's skills and qualifications, certain degrees and certifications, prior job experience, market data, and other relevant factors. Additional compensation may include a bonus, incentives, or commission.
Being you at Gohagan & Company:
Gohagan is an Equal Employment Opportunity Employer. The Company's policy is not to discriminate against any applicant or Associates based on race, color, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, religion, national origin, age (40 and over), disability, military status, including protected veteran status, genetic information or any other basis protected by applicable federal, state, or local laws. Gohagan also prohibits harassment of applicants or Associates based on any of these protected categories. It is also Gohagan's policy to comply with all applicable federal, state, and local laws respecting consideration of unemployment status in making hiring decisions.
Job Type: Full-time
Pay: $68,000.00 - $75,000.00 per year
Benefits:
- 401(k)
- 401(k) matching
- Dental insurance
- Employee assistance program
- Flexible spending account
- Health insurance
- Health savings account
- Life insurance
- Paid time off
- Referral program
- Retirement plan
- Vision insurance
Schedule:
- 8 hour shift
- Monday to Friday
Ability to Relocate:
- Chicago, IL 60631: Relocate before starting work (Required)
Work Location: Hybrid remote in Chicago, IL 60631
