WOOG'S WORLD / Dan Woog Find Johnnyjet, Will Travel Forget Travelocity. Ignore Expedia. Delete any other travel Web site you may have bookmarked. Today there is only one place to head for travel news, tips, planning guides, inside information, bargains and reservations. It's www.johnnyjet.com, and true to Johnny Jet's mission to bring the world closer together there is a Westport connection to a site that gets 100,000 hits a day from countries around the globe. JohnnyJet is the brainchild of Norwalk native John DiScala and also his nom de plume. A decade and a half ago, when he was a Brien McMahon High School student jet-skiing off Compo Beach, he nicknamed himself "Johnny Jet-Ski." After graduating from watercraft to airplanes, he shortened his name. "Johnny Jet" is a clever, accurate representation of both the man and his Web site. Thanks to a wonderfully designed and spectacularly comprehensive layout, business travelers, gate agents, flight attendants, even pilots know and love johnnyjet.com. Thanks to his relentless guerrilla marketing campaign, many of those people have come to know and admire the man behind it, too. The site gives new meaning to the word "comprehensive." There are links and phone numbers for airlines not just Delta and Continental, but Air Mauritius and Yugoslav too. You can access information on frequent flier miles, airport terminals, ground transportation, courier flights, currency exchanges, adoption travel, how much solar activity you are exposed to while in flight, even (ahem) nudist camps. In short, if it fits under the category of "going somewhere," Johnny Jet covers it. Just as intriguing is his weekly e-newsletter. Sent every Wednesday to anyone who asks, it connects users with the travel sections of newspapers around the country, highlights bargain fares, and answers questions travelers have always wondered about (my favorite involves flight attendants' mysterious "cross check and verify"). One of the most popular sections of the newsletter is "Where's Johnny Jet?" The guy gets around it seems he's always flying between coasts, up to Alaska or down to Argentina but there are frequent references to, and photos of, Connecticut. When, in consecutive weeks, I saw mentions of Stew Leonard's and the Saugatuck Rowing Club, I realized Johnny Jet occasionally landed right around the corner. So I e-mailed him, and within a few days we were having breakfast at a local diner. I could not have been more thrilled if I were sitting across from Charles Lindbergh himself. I learned that the man who now logs 150,000 miles a year was once terrified of flying. His fear caused him to pass up a $300 ticket to Singapore, and kept him from a dream vacation in Australia. But, thanks in part to a girl friend whose parents lived in Hong Kong, he overcame his phobia, and soon soared from being an avid flyer to an addicted one. Working for his alma mater, California's Loyola Marymount University, in the admissions office covering 26 states, from Hawaii to Connecticut he discovered the joys of frequent flier miles. His loyalty to United Airlines (and partner Hilton Hotels) paid off handsomely. He earned upgrades, free flights and free rooms. He no longer waited in lines, and was handed special phone numbers to call for even more perks. "I was like a junkie," Johnny admitted. "I called every day to hear how many miles I had." Then came the Web. He found he could check his miles online and, by booking via the Internet, earn even more miles. Occasionally, Johnny e-mailed five friends with news of special United offers. Soon he added links to Web cams, so his buddies could daydream at work. His friends passed the e-mails along to others. Soon complete strangers asked if they could get them too. Johnny increased the frequency of his e-mails. A compulsive bookmarker, he had so many they spilled out of folders, and he had no idea where to find anything. A friend organized them into portals. On Jan. 1, 2000, Johnny put those portals up on a Web site. His brother-in-law, with access to a mammoth server, hosted him for free. The next red-letter day was March 17, 2000, when USA Today featured JohnnyJet.com on its front Destinations page. Other newspapers followed, and Johnny was soon a cult hero. He has since been featured in such publications as the New York Times, Los Angeles Times and Fortune magazine. But JohnnyJet remains a one-man operation, and that means he relies primarily on his own wits. His marketing techniques range from logging onto public computers and making his site the start page, to attending travel conventions where he hands JohnnyJet T-shirts and stickers to CEOs of major corporations. It works: At one show, the head of Priceline saw him and yelled out, "Hey, Johnny Jet!" It was a fitting tribute for a man who loves nothing more than to travel. (His day job, managing a band called LMNT, involves what else? frequent plane trips for promotional events.) He can talk for hours on the subject, but when I asked what I figured to be a thought-provoking question: "What was your best travel experience?" he answered unhesitatingly. "Taking my mother to Europe," he said. "She didn't travel much, because she was always taking care of her four kids. When she got cancer, I took her to Europe. We flew first class, all over. The best was Denmark her father had been born there. It was great. She's the best travel companion I ever had." True to his helpful, outgoing nature, Johnny's basic rule of travel is simple: "Be patient and nice to everyone. Reservationists, gate agents, flight attendants, passengers whoever you see, be nice." When he helps a seatmate stow an overhead bag, he said, flight attendants notice and treat him well for the rest of the flight. Oh, yes, Johnny Jet always travels with boxes of chocolates, and hands them out to gate agents and flight attendants. He may have hundreds of thousands of frequent flier miles -- but there's more than one way to score an upgrade. Just one more tip you'll never find on Travelocity, Expedia or USAir's Web site. Westporter and author Dan Woog shares his thoughts every Friday in the Westport News. He can be contacted at dwoog@optonline.net |
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