This is an All Ears English podcast.
Episode 2045 the updated playbook for booking global travel in 2023, with Jared Kamrowski.
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The pandemic is over and the world is waiting for us, guys.
It's time to travel again.
But the way to book affordable travel has changed since 2019.
Today I have Jared from Thrifty Traveler on the show to give you his top three travel booking secrets, so that you can get out there and have your own adventure.
Listen in today.
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Expires at midnight on Friday. allersenglish.com slash b-l-a-c-k-f-r-i-d-a-y hello jared welcome to all ears english how are you today hey lindsay i'm doing great great i'm excited to have you on and to talk about travel which is a topic i'm super passionate about i know our listeners are and we're going to get some good stuff today in today's episode so first i'd like to introduce you to our audience guys on the show today we have jared kamrowski he is the founder of thrifty traveler the leading source for flight deals cheap travel tips, and maximizing credit card travel rewards.
Ooh, I'm so excited.
Jared honed his travel skills by traveling over a hundred nights a year in banking.
He left his corporate job in 2017 and now runs thrifty traveler full time with a team of 20.
You can catch him and his team flying the fanciest first class cabins, as well as budget Airlines paying pennies on the dollar.
He resides with his wife and son in Minneapolis Minnesota, so it sounds like you used to be in banking, is that right, Jared?
Yeah, not the most exciting job in the world, but it allowed me to travel and I just kind of got the bug there.
My wife wanted to travel and I had a bunch of student loan debt and I had to figure out how to travel on the cheap.
So that's kind of the Genesis, you know, thrifty traveler.
Yeah.
People wanted to know, you know, how do you and your wife travel so much?
Right.
And I made the website.
Yeah.
Yeah.
It's just exploded from there.
Okay.
I love it.
Was there one kind of moment when you said, Hey, you know, I'm done with this banking thing.
I no.
Travel is important to me.
Was there a moment on a flight or in an airline lounge or i don't know, when you walked out into a city, where you said this is what i want to dedicate my life to?
Yeah, it was just.
It was more even like this might sound nerdy and really boring, but like planning trips was so fun, and i was like every time i'd plan a trip and then we'd go, i'd be like oh, that was so, that was so enjoyable.
I got so much out of it.
Know, how can we do this more?
And then i kind of just worked backwards, like how can we replace our income, etc.
Which, of course, is a long story, but i was like i just need to do the thing that gives me so much back um, and do it more.
I love that.
I think our listeners are all going to connect with that, because we're a community of global professionals, right working on our english language skills, but really we want to be global citizens.
You know though, i just came back from egypt, and the way you feel when you come back from an international trip is just.
It's something so special.
Like your mind's been open to the world.
It's incredible.
So I'm on board with your mission, Jared.
Yeah, that new perspective from traveling, that's what it's all about.
Oh, it's so good.
So we know the why.
Now you know I think we all share this why that travel holds a very special place in our hearts.
But we want the how.
So we're hoping today that Jared, we can have you on the show to talk about three ways that we can travel, as we say in English, kind of on the cheap, like what are your travel secrets, right?
I've heard about people that do this kind of thing with credit cards out there, and they're always traveling.
Like you said, your friends noticed that you and your wife are always doing this, but I never quite understood why, or not why, but how.
How do they do it?
So let's get into your secrets if you're willing to share.
Absolutely.
Yeah.
What would be the first tip that all of our listeners could take advantage of?
Yeah, no matter where you live in the world, when you're booking flights, the one tool you should be using is google flights.
Uh, that's like.
That's like the best one is.
No matter where you live, wherever you're flying, almost always google flights is going to be the best tool you know.
Obviously, it's free to use.
It allows you to search very quickly through like 11 months of the calendar and then you can book directly through the airline and obviously, airlines all over the world, which just makes it super easy.
Okay, and is that because google is the largest search engine?
They scan everything on the web, or why is it google?
Why not?
I usually go to expedia.
I do do google flights, but sometimes they'll go to expedia or orbit.
Why google flights?
Yeah, google flights just because they're aggregating all that data, and probably the biggest difference from like a third party online travel agency like expedia or orbits is you're directly booking through the airline which, especially post pandemic.
Your life is going to be so much easier that if you have any kind of an issue with your flight or changes, you don't have to work through a third party.
You can work directly with the airline, pick up the phone, not involve anybody else.
And there's almost.
There's very rarely a difference in pricing between directly with the airline and orbits.
So there's not a whole lot of savings.
So we always say book direct. yeah that's the ticket i wonder if that's changed over the years since you know we were all traveling in the early 2000s i feel like orbits used to be cheaper and then it was more expensive to go direct but now maybe they've evened it out i don't know maybe that's just my perception it's not no for sure it's more of a level playing field right now um yeah and yeah it's it's uh google flights is is definitely i mean it's it's how we use you know we we're we're all about finding flight deals at thrifty traveler and we use that tool ourselves amongst many other tools but it's just a surefire thing it's easy and I do have to ask you what are your thoughts on hopper because I use the hopper app a lot to scan because they send you alerts and like oh book now or I don't know any other tool where it will tell me book now the price is not going to go down or wait to book do you like what are your thoughts on that app hopper yeah no and hopper's great um again you're kind of like working through a third party but it is great to find you know when you should be booking because it's always like how are you supposed to know if you're getting a good deal it's impossible unless you're like some kind of an expert right so i you know i think hopper's great you know google has some similar tools the problem with google flights is they don't have an app that makes it super easy um you know if you have a gmail account you can sign up for price alerts and also when you're booking, you can look at the bottom of Google flights before you book, it'll tell you, you know, is this flight cheaper, expensive in, in a historical perspective.
So Google flights has the same features, but it's maybe not as fancy and beautiful as Hopper is.
So it sounds like the point here though, is just scan as wide as you can at first, right?
Don't limit yourself to specific sides, just go wide and then narrow it down from there.
I love it.
Exactly.
So Google Flights is a good place.
Okay.
What would be your second tip?
What can our listeners do no matter where they live in the world, no matter where they want to go?
How can they travel on the cheap?
What are the secrets?
What's number two?
Yeah.
So we have a concept called the flight first rule here at Thrifty Traveler.
And it's all about rethinking the way you travel.
So we want, you know obviously, booking a flight a lot of times can be one of the most expensive parts of your trip.
Yeah so, finding the cheap flight and letting it guide you to maybe, a different destination or a different maybe, maybe you're traveling maybe a week different, you know, really letting the cheap flight be your guide instead of the.
The biggest mistake you can make as a traveler is saying i want to travel from you know, august 1st through the 7th and i and I'm going to Copenhagen and this is happening and now I need to find a flight.
Because once you kind of put yourself into a position where you're not flexible because flexibility is key you gotta try to remain flexible.
So booking your flight first and letting it guide you to where you're gonna go, that's the absolute best way to save on your next trip.
And how far in advance do you typically book your flights?
Like if you're booking personally, what is the recommendation?
How far will you go?
How close to the date will you go?
Yeah, I would definitely not recommend booking within, you know, 30 or 45 days, because flights can get more expensive.
The airlines know that.
So last minute bookings for the most part, you know, no longer exist.
So you know the best, I would say probably.
You know, three to six months out is when, I think, my wife and I book most of our travel.
And of course, what we recommend at Thrifty Traveler.
Yeah, that's kind of the ticket.
What we always do, especially if a flight's way out you're like oh, I want to go to Rome or I want to go to Cairo, similar to your recent trip.
I would set up a Google Flights price alert if you have a Gmail account and then just watch flight prices.
And when you see it drop big time, then book the ticket.
I like that.
So we kind of have to be always alert aware, checking those prices, doing a little active legwork ahead of time instead of just showing up saying oh, that's what it costs.
I'm just going to book it because I'm going to go.
Interesting.
Interesting.
I do feel like flight prices pre pandemic and post pandemic.
I see a real difference.
Do you see a real difference before the pandemic and after?
Significant, right?
The playbook of how airlines price different parts of the globe and just all these different things.
It's been thrown out the window.
And there's definitely, it's different for sure.
But we have to stay dedicated.
Sorry, go ahead, Jared.
No, no, go ahead.
No, I was going to say, especially domestic, you know, like US pricing.
I know we have people from all over the world, but like flight pricing has just changed.
It's gotten so much more expensive in other areas and cheaper in others.
You just need to know kind of where to look.
And that's what we're all about.
Well, that's why i like your flight for a flight first uh mentality, because then it becomes a little bit more of an adventure right, like i thought i wanted to go to japan, but i realized i could go to cambodia and it's a lot cheaper and i could create an adventure there.
And not a lot of people have been to cambodia from the us.
Right, it could be amazing exactly.
Yeah no it's, that's exactly true.
And as long as you have that open mind flexibility, That is how you save.
And it's really, I know it sounds really simple, but it is that simple.
I love it.
Okay.
So the flight first mentality, create your own adventure and then save on the flights.
And then you have a little bit more money to spend during your adventure.
I love it.
What would be the third thing we need to know to travel like an expert?
Yeah.
So, you know, we're still focusing on flights here with this next one as well.
And it's like, you know, what days are the cheapest to actually fly?
Like your butts in those seats, not when to book, but when you're me flying.
So flight pricing is all about supply and demand.
So the days that have the most demand, you know a lot of times are, you know, Sunday and Monday, when business travelers are traveling, and then also Friday and then Sunday, when you know people obviously are going to be traveling.
So you want to avoid those days.
So, okay. look at tuesday wednesday and saturday departures and returns just give it a test on your next flight um and i think you might be surprised to see that those days you know you can maybe save you know 20 to 40 on your next flight just being flexible this all goes back to that flexibility that we touched on earlier yeah flexibility is huge yeah so if you can be a little flexible what are your thoughts on red eyes do you is that a hard line for you do you do red eyes or no no no I'm starting to get closer to 40 years old so I when I was in my 20s absolutely like I would do any of those things but now that stuff is getting more and more painful for me I'll be honest it's tough believe it or not I still do them and I'm in that age range as well uh I still do it when I fly back because I'm from the east coast but I live in Denver so I go back a lot to the east coast and I pay for it every time but you can save big and then when it comes to booking just a little piece of curiosity I bet our listeners are curious about this too so you mentioned midweek is a good time to fly but is there something around when you book I had heard maybe this is a rumor that if you book like I think it's Saturdays the day you make the booking not when you travel is the flights will show up as more expensive is that true or is that just a rumor that's you know generally yeah it's a rumor uh it used to be like Tuesdays was like when flight inventory was put out like we're talking like 10 20 years ago okay um and that's when you saw like flight prices were like cheaper on Tuesdays booking on Tuesdays um but that's just not true anymore and you know we're constantly looking at tens of thousands of different flights every single day at thrifty traveler and we see flight flight deals every single day so that's why know like going back to google flights setting up those flight price alerts yeah just having some automation out there to send an email into your inbox and then when flights prices drop then just book and not being focused on you know when what day of the week you're actually booking yeah so it sounds like a great playbook yeah it kind of sounds like the playbook has changed a little bit we need to update our playbook for booking travel but the world is still out there and waiting for us, right?
I mean, that feeling we get, that we talked about at the beginning, is still gonna be there after a pandemic event, right?
We're out in the world, we can explore the world, the world's waiting for us.
I want to encourage our listeners, guys, to update your own playbook in terms of how you book.
Be a little more strategic, a little smarter.
Know that what worked in 2010 doesn't work in 2023 and go with the new rules.
This is awesome, Jared.
Where can our listeners find your website, what you guys do and learn more?
Maybe you have a blog or something over there.
Yeah, go to thriftytraveler.com.
Simple as that.
And yeah, our big thing is Thrifty Traveler Premium, which is our flight deal alert service.
Cool.
So check that out as well.
All right, great.
Thanks for coming on the show and letting us know about the new way to book in 2023.
I'm just excited for my next trip.
I love travel.
Me too.
Thanks for having me, Lindsay.
Thanks again, Jared.
Take care.
Bye.
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