From Booming to Crickets: What the Heck Happened to My Travel Biz?

Alternate Title: Boom. Bust. Blog.

The Boom

In April 2025, my thriving travel business died overnight. Poof. Gone. Just like that.

You see, I'm a travel advisor, and at the start of 2025, I was having my best year ever. And by best, I mean successful. Lucrative.

To give you some backstory, I've been running my own travel agency as a solopreneur since 2018. And slowly but steadily, I've built up a roster of loyal clients. Then, they began referring their friends to me, and those clients started to refer their friends. Word was slowly spreading. And by this year, 2025, my business was booming.

In fact, from December 2024 through early April 2025, I worked every single day – nights, weekends, holidays included. New clients were coming out of the woodwork, inquiries were flying in, and honestly? I was loving it.

One day, I'd be planning a honeymoon to South Africa, complete with safari, a visit to the Winelands, and a jaunt to see the penguins in Cape Town. Next, it was a family's summer escape to Switzerland and Austria. Then, it was a couple's culinary trek through Italy with food tours galore in places like Modena and Parma. Then, a family getaway to Malta. It was nonstop. Business was great. And I was having fun.

I love what I do. I love helping people see the world, especially when I get to design custom, immersive trips that spark joy, connection, and meaning. I don't sell pre-built packages or do cookie cutter one-size-fits-all trips. Every single itinerary I create is crafted from scratch, and built around each client's hopes, travel style, and budget. My clients and I go back and forth until every detail is just right. Plus, my brain thrives on the variety and constant change: one moment I'm researching yacht charters in Croatia, and the next I'm sourcing the best pad Thai cooking class in Bangkok. In other words, every day is different. And every trip is a new puzzle, a new story, and a new adventure, both for them and for me. And honestly? That's bliss.

By early April 2025, I had nearly matched all of 2024's sales. I was high-fiving myself in the mirror and working so hard I didn't even have time to breathe. But I didn't care; I was in it.

Business was so good, in fact, that I finally booked a real vacation with my husband: our first-ever solo trip without the kids: a weeklong Windstar yacht cruise in the Mediterranean.

But guess what? I worked every single day of that vacation. My poor husband spent so much time alone in the Yacht Club lounge while I worked in our cabin that by the end of the week, he was basically a regular. I kid you not when I say he was on a first-name basis with half the guests. And by the end of the cruise, he was practically a part of the staff.

And when I had a milestone birthday in January? I worked that whole day, too. I'm not sure I even blew out a candle.

The Bust

But then, around April 19th of this year, my business died. Out of nowhere. It's like all of a sudden, everything came to a screeching halt. Trips were getting canceled. New inquiries all but vanished. And my inbox, which used to flood with 100+ emails a day (I wish I were exaggerating), was seeing fewer than ten emails a day.

And it's not just the trips that were already booked that were getting canceled. Oh no. The heartbreak went deeper than that. The gorgeous couples retreat to Mallorca I spent weeks perfecting? Canceled. Two whole days of research into boutique hotels with the perfect sunset views, specialty wine tastings, and private sailing excursions - - poof. Gone.

And the family adventure trip to Costa Rica? The one with tailor-made activities for each of their three kids, with waterfalls, jungle lodges, and adventure stuff? They put it on hold because they were waiting "to see what happens" in the world.

That bucket-list journey through Zimbabwe and Botswana I was working on, complete with Victoria Falls, safaris, and hands-on adventure? Frozen mid-draft.

These weren't just vague inquiries or dreams, I was actively working on these trips. I'd been researching, pricing, curating, and mapping everything out… and my weeks of effort were suddenly gone.

Here's the gut punch no one tells you about being a travel advisor: I don't get paid until people actually travel. That's right; I work on commission. So all those hours, days, sometimes weeks of work I pour into these trips? I don't see a dime if the trip doesn't happen. So yeah, things were bleak.

The Inquiry Drought

Why do I think this happened? Well, back in April, a tsunami of economic anxiety was crashing over everyone. Many of my clients are based in the D.C. area, my hometown, and unprecedented layoffs were hitting hard (remember DOGE’s massive cuts?). On top of that, there were multiple tariff-related market crashes, a wave of new travel bans, and just... an overwhelming sense of global uncertainty. And when things feel shaky at home, travel is often the first thing to go. Totally understandable, but still, ouch.

So suddenly I was left with something I hadn't had in months: time. After working non-stop for nearly five months, every day, every night, and every weekend, I suddenly had lots of hours to fill. And let me tell you: I don't know how to sit still. It's how I'm wired. If I'm not planning trips, I'm sitting at my desk like a golden retriever waiting for someone to throw me a ball.

The Travel Awards No One Asked For

So here's what I did with that strange little window of quiet: I started writing a travel blog series called "The Travel Awards No One Asked For."

You see, over the past several years I’ve been fortunate enough to explore more than 40 countries across 6 continents. (That pesky #*&%$ Drake Passage crossing!)

And there's a quote I love that goes something like, "I write to understand what I think."

Only for me, it’s also "I write to understand what I've experienced."

Which means, basically, that I need to write things down to make sense of them.

So after having visited a lot of places, giving out these totally unofficial, highly subjective travel awards has become my way of processing everything. Not just the cold, hard facts of where I’ve been, and what I’ve seen, but how everything has made me feel.

So no, no one asked me for these awards. But I started mentally giving them out anyway.

These awards are my no-holds-barred take on the places I've loved (and why), the destinations that surprised me (in good and bad ways), the ones that deserve more attention, and the sleeper picks that no one's talking about, but should be.

Such as:

• The most underrated country in the world

• The destination that surprised me the most (in ways I never expected)

• The best family-friendly spot that's flying completely under the radar

• And more

My Way of Processing the World

Mind you, my collection of “awards” is no Travel + Leisure's "World's Best" list. But it’s my list. And after writing about some of my favorite places, I thought of other travel-related things I wanted to write about. So, I kept writing.

I wrote about travel tips I had; I wrote guides to some of my favorite places; I wrote some travel-related how-to articles; and so on. Basically, I started brain dumping my accumulated travel knowledge.

Then, in mid-June (last month), my travel business started to pick up, and I became busier with work again. Thank goodness.

And while I'm not as busy now as I was at the beginning of 2025, I’ve been working steadily, which is nice. But because I'm not slammed with work, I still have time to write.

The Amazing Place is Born

So.. I’ve decided to turn my brain dump into something more. Originally, I was going to call this space "The Travel Awards No One Asked For," but that title felt too narrow for all the travel news, insider guides, itineraries, and hard-won observations I want to share.

I’ve landed instead on "The Amazing Place." Because, let’s face it, this world is amazing, isn’t it?

And this newsletter is my way of processing it all: the beautiful, the surprising, and the lessons learned along the way.

Join Me/TLDR

In a nutshell, this (blog? newsletter?) is my personal, unsponsored, no-holds-barred take on the world of travel. It’s about the stories behind the bookings. The travel moments that stick. The things I’ve learned, and the things I’m still figuring out.

Thanks for reading all the way to the end. If you're still with me, I think we’re going to get along just fine.