Timeshare Company Lays Off Employees as it Refocuses Marketing Efforts

In blog posts twice this week, The Timeshare Authority blog has talked about how some timeshare sales companies (timeshare developers) are adjusting their marketing plans in order to focus on their most responsive demographics. And who is most likely to buy timeshare? Why people who already own timeshare!

Now Orange Lake Resorts, an Orlando timeshare that is part of Holiday Inn Club Vacations, announces it is making this type of marketing move, which unfortunately calls for employee layoffs in the process. The decision to eliminate many of the Orange Lake Resorts timeshare concierge locations, primarily in Orlando hotels, means the company will be laying off employees who typically booked hotel guests into Orange Lake timeshare tours.

Stacey Sutherland, vice-president of corporate communications and brand services for Orange Lake explains, “Instead of cold calling, if you will, you get to speak with someone who’s already heard about you and is curious. You’re talking to a customer who already knows and loves Holiday Inn.”

The Orange Lake Resorts timeshare cutbacks will involve some 120 positions, including the company’s concierge post at Universal Orlando. Sutherland says that some of the employees from outposts that are closing are being asked to rejoin the company in other positions.

The traditional timeshare sales model has never been inexpensive, in that it involves extensive one-on-one time between employees and potential timeshare buyers and frequently includes gifts or perks, that the consumer revives whether or not he or she makes a buying decision. As long as this approach forms the core of the timeshare sales model, it makes sense that in a tight economy a timeshare company will focus its attention on the most qualified consumers who most closely fit the demographic of current timeshare owners.