by Padraic Gilligan, Vice President, Industry Relations MCI and Vice President, Ovation Global DMC Remembering the Days of the Old Schoolyard I was always good at rote learning. I found it easy in school to memorise quotations from Shakespeare, formulae for maths class or lyrics to songs. I can still remember chunks of Julius Caesar… Read more »
by Padraic Gilligan, VP, Industry Relations, MCI Aisle or Window? I’m an aisle man through and through. Quick access to over-head lockers, fast track to the loo, it affords me the illusion of control in a place where, ultimately, I have zero control. For this trip I book very late and end up in a… Read more »
by Padraic Gilligan, VP, Ovation Global DMC and VP, Industry Relations, MCI How do you create demand? Previously on this blog I’ve stated that you need to know weird and wonderful people to be truly successful as a destination management company. DMC legends like Laurie Sprouse in Dallas/Fort Worth or Patrick Sullivan in NYC are… Read more »
by Padraic Gilligan, VP Industry Relations, MCI I recently attended the Bruce Springsteen & the E Street Band “Wrecking Ball” tour and was left with 2 over-riding impressions. Firstly, music is a powerful, indispensable source of healing, salvation and redemption (themes, incidentally, that recur like middle eights in Bruce’s oeuvre). Secondly, as MCI’s CEO, Sebastien… Read more »
by Padraic Gilligan, Managing Partner, SoolNua I will arise and go now, for always night and day I hear lake water lapping with low sounds by the shore; While I stand on the roadway, or on the pavements grey, I hear it in the deep heart’s core “The Lake Isle of Innisfree”, W.B Yeats Moira… Read more »
by Padraic Gilligan, Vice President, Industry Relations, MCI Recently I spent a wonderful week under azur blue skies and long lingering sunsets on the Greek island of Santorini. When my mind wasn’t captured by the vicissitudes of the intriguing life of John James Todd, protagonist of The New Confessions by William Boyd, it was captured… Read more »
by Padraic Gilligan, VP, Industry Relations MCI and VP Ovation Global DMC Merton’s Law An infestation of mink was playing havoc with the eco-system of a rural area so, to encourage a proactive community response, the local authorities instituted a bounty of $5 for each mink turned in at the local sheriff’s office. The scheme… Read more »
I posted on my Delta Airlines experience on Tuesday last and on Wednesday, upon my return to the office, there was a letter from Delta in my pigeon hole. My first communication had been copied to the nice people in Dublin and they had forwarded it to the Executive Office in Atlanta. Effectively there were… Read more »
I’m seething with rage at Delta Airlines. When I needed an airline to be “human” and to understood a painful personal situation I was treated appallingly with extreme disrespect. When I then spent considerable time documenting this experience for the airline I was told that complaints had been “out-sourced” to another airline and then I… Read more »
Galveston, Wichita, Phoenix are not what you might consider tier 1 destinations. Yet for a while they were probably the three US cities that I thought most about. If you’re a fan of great American songwriters you’ll know why – Jimmy Webb wrote three perfect songs with these cities in their titles and then Glen… Read more »