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FTA Executive Outlines Strategy

GoF:  Will FTA hold its own events?

Abbott: The first thing we’re going to do is create FTA Day at Travel Exchange, NTA’s annual convention. We are consolidating the FTA events to one day so that people can have the opportunity to attend for a short time instead of an entire week.

 

GoF:  How will you attempt to reach travel buyers?

Abbott: That’s one of my primary areas of focus. We’re trying to include the end users. They can join for $50 and get access to our benefits. But these aren’t travel industry professionals — they’re the staff people at the local churches who are tasked with planning travel. That’s the key to the success of FTA. We want to give them access to the world of faith-based travel.

So many people never take faith-based trips because they think they can’t afford them. But the industry is bending over backward to make it affordable. If we can create a system that mobilizes more people of faith, we’ve made a real contribution to the world.

 

GoF:  How much of a role will missions travel play in FTA?

Abbott: That’s TBD. Most denominations have been encouraging more and more missions trips and partnering with organizations that make that happen. The end users are so diverse, though, that no one has been able to bring the variety of missions organizations into one place. So we’d like to be able to bring church leaders onto our website and help match them up with the mission organization that is the best fit. This is something we’re actively working on.