Profile  (as of 29 March 2001) (applicable until revised)

You may wonder if you fit the Mekong Express profile. The website has been in existence nearly four years. Patterns have emerged.

Mekong Express bookers generally fit into one of the following professional types:

banker
diplomat
educator
engineer
lawyer
priest
psychiatrist
importer
writer

I often enter a client's name in Google, the search engine. Nearly fifty percent of the time the name comes up.

Many clients have Ph.D.s and are in their 50s and 60s.

Approximately 50% of Mekong Express clients ask that plane tickets and hotel vouchers be forwarded to residences, offices or Bangkok hotel rooms. Via DHL, we have made deliveries as far afield as Nairobi.

More and more, Mekong Express is orienting itself towards this niche market. What I like about it is the fact that such clients are genuinely interested in discovering the magic of Laos and its indigenous people. (It takes time and money to do this properly.)

In short, the profile is that of the sophisticated traveler. Cost is seldom the issue (only young travelers and some clients with children complain that Laos is expensive). Per person, US$500 to 1,000 is frequently spent. As might be expected, efficiency and convenience are critical issues. I regularly book Thailand and Vietnam for the same clients.

An interesting footnote. To date, clients in the above categories have never contacted me using hotmail addresses. While Mekong Express clients may use such addresses while traveling, they typically start out with corporate email addresses. Inquiries that arrive via hotmail and yahoo tend to reflect that the browser is in the lowest end of the travel market. Testing which way the wind is blowing, I usually send these people credit card payment forms straight off. Most of them disappear immediately.

See you in Laos,

James Michener (aka Mekong Jim)