Desicow.com blog

Last blog we wrote about the Star Alliance Frequent Flyer of the month. This month we introduce you to the Frequent Flyer Program of Emirates.

In the past quarter or so Emirates has started service from major airports in US to the most of the big cities in India, if it did not have one already existing. So as traveller to India, you are more likely to choose Emirates over other airlines, given that this airline gives good deals on air tickets to India.

Emirates Frequent Flyer program is called SkyWards. Its got 3 tiers, starts with Blue, then as you accumulate miles you upgrade to Silver, and subsequently to the Gold Tier. The Skywards miles can be redeemed not only for Emirates Flights, but also partner airlines of Emirates like

- Continental Airlines,
- Japan Airlines,
- Kingfisher Airlines,
- Korean Air,
- South African Airways,
- United Airlines
- Virgin Blue.

A roundtrip flight from India to USA consists of 15,000 to 16,000 miles depending on starting and ending points, for a family of 2 adults and 1 or more children this can add up to around 40-50,000 miles. These miles can be used in India to fly local with Jet Airways or Kingfisher Airlines, or you can redeem these when you come back to US, while flying with Continental / United. So next time plan to buy tickets to India,  don’t forget to ask your travel agent about getting yourself enrolled in the Emirates SkyWards program.

In the days since you downloaded the DesiCow.com we have updated the US-India Travel kit, adding printable labels for your bags. Just print the label, write your name, address and phone numbers and stick them on to your bags. Happy Flying!!!

If a typical Desi family of 2 adults and 1 or more kids fly to India, every year, they accumulate a lot of miles. If you only spend a short time to learn about earning and consolidating frequent flyer (or buyer) miles, who knows you can earn atleast one ticket free every 2-3 year or so…

We will talk briefly about some Frequent Flyer programs… this time we start with Star Alliance. Star Alliance is the world’s first and largest airline alliance. It was founded in 1997, with 5 members; it has since grown to 21 participating airlines.

The advantage of flying through Star Alliance is that you can redeem miles that you accumulated from any Star Alliance member airline for any Star Alliance member flights. So you can redeem your Airline miles from say Singapore Airlines, in a flight operated by United Airlines, because both these airlines are part of Star Alliance.

Some of the participating airlines in Star Alliance are:

1. Singapore Airlines
2. United Airlines
3. US Airways
4. Air Canada
5. Lufthansa
6. Air India was scheduled to be a full member by mid-2009
7. Continental Airlines is scheduled to be a full member by September 2009

According to the Star Alliance Website, this is what you need to do to get your frequent flyer miles.

1. Quote your frequent flyer number every time you book with any Star Alliance member airline or travel provider. Your number appears on your membership card.
2. Show your membership card when you check in for any flight to ensure you earn your miles or points.
3. Save your passenger receipts and boarding passes. If your miles or points do not appear on your account, send your tickets and boarding passes to your frequent flyer programme service centre and have them credited to your account. Allow six to eight weeks from the date of request.

We will write more about Frequent Flyer Programs of airlines in subsequent newsletters… Till then… fly smart.

Best regards from The DesiCow.com Team.

If you go out and ask 10 Indians “What are different places/ways to buy Air tickets to India ?”. Some of the answers you will get :
* local Travel Agents
* websites like makemytrip, priceline, kayak etc

If you go out and ask 10 Indians “Who gives the cheapest?”
9 out of 10 will tell you that “Travel Agents”

There is no way you can beat price given by travel agents. If you have an impressions from those funky ads claiming $500 ticket to India, they are absolutely false claims. These are just marketing tricks to get you interested in those website. If you don’t agree with me go to these websites and ask them to give you that $500 ticket and believe me they will come up with 10 UN-doable conditions in your travel for buying that $500 ticket.

Travel Agents give best price.
(how they get cheapest ticket will be discussed in some other blog entry).

Before starting Desicow.com project I asked myself one question: Is Desicow.com something I will use personally when shopping for Air tickets to India? answer was ‘YES’.

I checked with 10 different people and they said they will use it too.

If it helps me, if it helps 10 other people in my network, I am sure it will help 100s of people like us.

I am starting a website where Travel Agents will be able to get in touch with potential customers who are shopping for air tickets to India. Of course tickets need to cheapest and should beat all other prices.

Mr. X runs a travel agency, selling tickets to India. Business is doing all good.

One fine day he comes across a website which claims to solve an important issue in same business and also claims that website will give boost to Mr X’s business.

For some reason Mr. X decides to give this website a shot, so that he is not left behind in competition. Within minutes Mr. X realizes that website does solve problem if it is able to attract users who are shopping out for Air tickets to India. He also finds that website is not free. There is a small fees involved in using website to get business out of it.

Is it wrong to ask your first few customers(Travel Agencies in my case) to pay for using website?

Almost all of my friend said ‘YES’. Everyone said - “make it FREE for first few Agencies”

I can guess some of the reason they are thinking:
1) Travel agencies will avoid using website because of fees involved.
2) no one wants to pay money to a new website.
3) You will get more travel agents on board if you make it free
4) Its always easy to start asking for fees once website gets bit old and popular.

However I have some different thoughts in my mind.

1) A business owner doesn’t care about some small amount of money, if in return, website is really helping his business. In fact he will surely avoid wasting time on some website which doesn’t help him(even if it FREE).

2) As business owner instead of spending small amount he is more concern about how he can get more out of this website, promote his business and sell more tickets.

3) Desicow.com is actually bringing a travel agent closer to potential ticket buyer; its way better then wasting money on other websites for advertisement.

Desicow.com is going to give Travel agents 100s of ticket leads over a period of time. Travel Agents will get access to these leads from all across USA.

I want these travel agencies to push me to add more tools and features to website. I want them to make me go crazy fixing any issues and get more potential ticket buyers. This kind of coomunication will only come in to picture if these travel agencies have paid for using website. They are serious about business and now they have paid to use desicow.com , so desicow.com better be a sincere website.

Hi there!
This is the first blog entry from the official blog of DesiCow.com website.

What is DesiCow.com ?
- its a simple website to help you buy cheapest air tickets to India.
- its not a world-changing website but it solves one simple problem which all Indians face when they are shopping for cheap air tickets to India.

Website is still in stealth mode and I am planning to launch beta version within next 10 days. Please keep watching this space to know more about desicow.com website and team.