Terry Bahri, who works with the En Route Travel Office in Pacific Palisades, has been named one of the top 25 travel agents of 2013 by Travel Agent magazine.
Bahri specializes in luxury leisure and corporate travel, and plans destination weddings and honeymoons as well as luxury cruises. Destinations include Europe, Mexico, the Caribbean, Asia, Australia, Tahiti and the South Pacific. She has been certified by Virtuoso and Crystal Cruises.
Born in Egypt and raised in Lebanon, Bahri started traveling throughout Europe at age 18, and lived in France, Belgium and Greece before moving to the United States in 1980. She is fluent in English, French and Arabic and can successfully dabble in Spanish and Italian. Her business background includes working in banking (Citibank and Mercantile National Bank), sales and the textile industry.
“I owned my own company, International Textile Sales, and I represented yarn, fabric and t-shirt companies worldwide, including American Apparel and Guess. But I decided to change careers after 15 years of sales because I wanted to do something that was fulfilling.”
Bahri, who lives in Santa Monica, joined En Route Travel (at 15221 Sunset) in 2009. “I had traveled all my life,” she said. “Travel is my hobby and my passion, so what better career to have than that?”
Although she’s a relative newcomer in the industry, Bahri has shown a lot of resourcefulness.
For example, she booked an FIT (Fully Independent Travel) trip for a client traveling from China to Japan even though, she admits, “I was unfamiliar with Japan.” But she did her homework and was able “to craft the most perfect itinerary, including tea ceremonies, fish market auction, staying at ryokans [traditional Japanese inns] and experiencing the snow monkeys.”
Likewise, she arranged for a client to stay at a five-star hotel in Florence, but since the property was in the center of town, the location proved too noisy. Bahri, after first trying to change the client’s room, was able to book a quieter hotel.
Bahri has traveled all over the world and is hard-pressed to pick one favorite, though she especially loves Paris (“I go there as often as I can; I have a French education and I used to live in Paris, so for me, it’s like going back home”) and Tahiti: “I have been there more than five times.”
Her clients have varied tastes. “This year I’ve had a lot of clients go to London, Paris, Rome and Croatia. I am also seeing a lot of interest in Southeast Asia and the Far East, and I have clients interested in exploring remote luxury private island resorts.”
One such resort is Laucala, an island in Fiji owned by the owner of RedBull, and another is Necker Island in the Caribbean, owned by Sir Richard Branson. “These islands are private and can be booked exclusively for one person or one family,” Bahri said. “Being on a private island is so relaxing and peaceful.”
One of the trips she organized to Asia included a cruise on Ha Long Bay in Vietnam, a shopping spree in Singapore and a beach in Bali. A French-speaking guide was on hand as well.
Bob Preston, president of Europanache, lauds Bahri’s ability to put together trips that “involved considerable customized planning. I could not have had such successful travel experiences without Terry’s incredible assistance.”
Previewing travel bookings at En Route Travel for this fall and into the winter, Bahri said: “I feel that the Great Recession is way behind us, especially when it comes to the luxury travel industry. I personally have more than five bookings for next year. We have not seen such advance bookings in a while!”
She said she has clients worldwide, “but I would say the majority of En Route’s clients are in the Palisades.”
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