Does Dr. Seligman Have A Sister?

I learned my lesson about posting baby pictures a few weeks ago, so I am not going to go there again while addressing another inconsistency in the rhetoric from YTB.

Recently, there has been a flurry of comments about how many TTAs are flocking to YTB because they have all "seen the light" and understand what a great program it is. I cannot dispute that they have some TTAs in their mix--they probably do; but I think I can call into question the curriculum vitae (that Latin phrase was for Dr. Bob) of the agents they claim to have. Last week, on the blog called Just Picture It Now, there was an entire post devoted to Candi May, who was a hot shot travel agent in Kentucky for decades before joining YTB.

Some of the claims made by this blog include the "fact(s) that Candi May:

• owned several Brick and Mortar Agencies back in the day
• she was the one who was winning all the awards
• isn’t some rookie off the street who knew nothing about Travel

I am very friendly with the owner of the largest travel agency in Kentucky (actually they are also the largest in Tennessee and Southern Ohio as well) and as hard to believe as it is--they have never heard of someone named Candi May owning agencies in Kentucky. No one seems to be aware of all these awards she won.

And while we are dealing with the "unbelievable", there is this excerpt from the blog touting her credentials:

A former client then asked her to take a look at a business, not for her, but for him.

What she did do was look at the public numbers, she looked at our Founders, and she looked at what other successful people were doing in this business. She also went up to meet the Founders personally.

YTB was a company that was actually capitalizing on the very same market shift that was causing her Brick & Mortar business to loose all this business.

OK, so let me get this straight to be sure I understand....a client comes into her office and says, "Candi, I am looking at buying an internet agency to compete with you--do you have an opinion?" Well, my opinion would likely have been "Get the hell out of my office." But apparently, Candi's answer was to say, "Let me check it out and get back to you," as she purchased tickets to fly up to meet Coach and Scott herself just to offer an opinion to a client who was looking to compete with her. Yeah---right!

This blog entry really raised some flags for me--as so many of the other blog entries do--ADI acquisition, Dr. Bob, etc. So I sent Candi an email asking about her agency. While I will not repost her email here, her response did not confirm anything about her experience. She referenced an agency owned by a relative, and then included several links to companies that are no longer in business. Nothing about her and her awards, nothing about her agency awards.

On a follow up, she indicated that a major travel company (I am choosing to not name them) paid for her to fly to their headquarters and she spent many days having them wine and dine her in an attempt to get her to join their ranks--which she declined. This too sat funny with me since I could not picture this agency being a major player in the Kentucky market. Well, after a quick email, I can confirm that this major travel company (I know the CEO) indeed did not pay for anyone named Candi May to come to their headquarters. As a matter of fact, the only "Candi" they have in their system of prospects, was a "Candy" from Michigan.

So, do we have a long lost reunion coming up pretty soon. Is Candi May, the good Dr. Seligman's long lost sister? So now do we have the trifecta of wrong information? Seligman, ADI and now Candi May! Can anyone add some shred of truth to the claims? Candi may have been all that; but it seems like maybe not!