Start With A Win - Travel Tips and Hacks With CEO Adam Contos

Episode Date: November 9, 2018

As you can imagine, Adam is a frequent traveler. On this episode of the Start with a Win podcast, he shares with us his travel tips and hacks to make traveling a good experience instead of something you dread.Get to the airport early. You never know how long security will take, and you don’t want to start out your travel day stressed that you are going to miss your flight. BONUS: Take an Uber rather than having to worry about and pay for parking.Travel with a carry-on if at all possible, and pack smart by using packing cubes.Get TSA Pre-check or Global Entry to make the security process as quick and painless as possible. Some airports also have the Clear program that is similar, so look into what will be most convenient for your local airport and go through the process to get approved.Take noise-cancelling headphones with you and make the most of your “me” time by listening to audiobooks or podcasts.Choose an airline to be loyal to and sign up for their frequent flier program. BONUS: Invest in their club membership or buy a one-day pass to gain access to refreshments and free wi-fi as well as an exclusive customer service desk that will rebook your flight for you if you have an issue.Stay healthy by taking Vitamin C supplements and traveling with Clorox wipes to clean any surfaces around your seat or in the waiting area.By following these tips, your travel days can be enjoyable and effortless!Connect with Adam:https://www.startwithawin.com/https://www.facebook.com/adamcontosREMAXCEO/https://twitter.com/REMAXAdamContoshttps://www.instagram.com/REMAXadamcontos/

At top of the 12th floor of the Remax World Headquarters, you're listening to Start With a Win with CEO Adam Kantos. What's up everybody? Adam Kantos here, top of the Remax World Headquarters building. Actually not the top. I'm on the 12th floor of 12. I'm not standing outside on top of this. It'd be cold.

It would. It would, wouldn't it, Mark? It would be a little cold. Yeah. So, hey, with us here today, producer Mark. Hey, everybody. How you doing, man? So good. So good. Yeah.

I love it. You're like the most enthusiastic person I know. Well, you know, I always say that positive things happen to positive people. And I have a fantastic life, and I just attribute it to that. Golly, that warms my heart. I love it. I love it. You should be on the news. Well, I have a face for radio, so this is perfect. Awesome. So, hey, today, Mark, we are going to talk about travel hacks. Dude, I love that. You travel a lot, so you should know some hacks. A ton. you know i know

like the secret ways through the airport the tunnels the tunnels yeah nobody nobody will hear this right yeah this is secret it's yeah totally secret secret because recently too i mean didn't you just have like a monster travel session massive like four cities and... Yeah, four cities. I think it was like three flights, four cities. 3,300 miles in one day. Oh, that makes me queasy. If you do it right, it's not as painful. Travel should be kind of an exciting thing. It should be pleasurable.

You should go and say, I really enjoyed that trip, right? Yeah. Instead of that trip was a huge pain. It seems like it's time that you can be productive right if you're traveling that's hours you're sitting on a plane or hours waiting in a terminal that you can probably use to your advantage totally it's just you got to do it right otherwise you think that it's going to be tough and the whole customer experience is is not what you want it to be which you know frankly the airlines get a lot of uh a lot of pushback because everybody goes uh they're not happy or you're not happy or it's terrible, they don't care, things like that, which really isn't the case.

You can actually enjoy the heck out of it. Really? Wow. Well, what are some things that will help us enjoy this, Adam? Let me get into this, Mark. You're like, please help me with my next travel session. Obviously, first of all is getting to the airport. There are the people that like to actually stress themselves out and run to the plane.

I don't want to wait in the airport. Well, in all reality, you don't know how long it's going to take you to get through security. That's true. I mean, when's the last time anybody ever checked on those? Security lines are this many minutes right now. Nobody. I didn't even know that existed. Yeah.

Yeah, exactly. There you go. So, you know, first of all, I mean, first of all is arrive. Get there. minutes right now nobody i didn't even know that existed so yeah exactly there you go so so um you know first of all i mean first of all is arrive get there have an uber or a car service or something like that i think the easiest way to get to the airport is frankly like an uber so or totally you don't have to worry about parking it's like you gotta mortgage your house to park your car to your airport anymore it's like 20 or 30 bucks a day half the time and and then you know you gotta deal with traffic and and an uber ride might be 30 bucks right right yeah it's i mean it's not that much yeah you and

support the economy for crying out loud right that's right you know some guy is driving an uber because he wants to make a little extra money for his family. I mean, give him the opportunity or a good car service. I have a guy that drives me every time. I call him. I'm like, hey, dude, I need to go to the airport. He's like, you bet. When? And so I don't have to worry about parking.

I don't have to worry about if something's going sideways. You hop in your car and you're out of gas. You're like, ugh. Right. Now I got to stop it. That adds a level of stress. Right. I have a car service that's called my neighbor there you go just call him up hey man my neighbor

car service.com right hey i like it there you go so all right so you get there okay and then what so what you should do i truly believe i hardly ever uh check a bag i usually do carry on that's clutch there's a technique to that though, my friend. Okay. There's a huge technique to that. It's how you pack, right? Can you fit it in a suitcase? Now, my wife will go, yeah, not so much. Yeah, mine too. I know she's listening to this also. Sorry, babe. But I can't fit my stuff in those 3-1-1, that little one-quart bag to get through TSA line but and that's fine if you're going to check a bag check a bag but regardless there's there's these really cool

things called packing cubes that they're like little zipper cloth boxes that you you put fold up your clothes and you kind of squish them down a little bit in the packing cube and then it's like putting together a jenga puzzle in your suitcase. Yeah. I mean, I think I paid like $30 for packing cubes on Amazon. Okay. Totally worth it. Totally worth it. Yeah.

And it really satisfies my OCD as well. Everything has a place. That's it. Yeah. I can fit four pairs of socks and three t-shirts and my workout shorts and stuff like that in this packing cube. Nice. and three t-shirts and you know my workout shorts and stuff like that in this packing cube nice and so i mean it's i'll tell you it actually saves me so much because when i'm traveling i just pull out of the packing cube what i want for that that leg of the trip or if i'm there the whole time i can just either put the packing cube in the hotel drawer or whatever it is i'm organized

it's i mean step one packing cube when you're packing. Yes. So that's tip number one for travel hacks, okay? Tip number two, you get to the airport. You know, you've packed, you got your Uber, your car service, whatever there. It is worth, if you travel just a fair amount, I'm not talking like one trip a year or whatever,

but if you're going to travel on occasion, getting TSA pre-check. Oh, that's the money. I have TSA pre-check. It's the best. Love it. You don't have to pull out your computer. You don't have to take off your shoes. Right.

You don't have to take off your hat or hoodie or sweater or jacket, whatever. Yeah. The goal is once you hit that TSA person and they scan your boarding pass or whatever, look at your ID, you don't want to stop walking if possible. Right. Until you get to your terminal. goal is once you hit that tsa person you know and they they scan your boarding pass or whatever look at your id you don't want to stop walking if possible right until you get to your terminal so you know pre-check and i i actually went one step further i did global entry because i travel out of the country and that allows you to go through customs easier but it gives you pre-check when you're in the u.s okay nice so um and you just basically you fill out something online, you make a little appointment,

they interview you, and then voila, you have it. I think it's for like five years or whatever it is. I don't remember exactly, but it corresponds to your passport and stuff like that. So, but pre-check. You want pre-check and make sure your known traveler number is in your profile in whatever

airline you travel on, which by the way, if you haven't signed up for frequent flyer miles in whatever you're traveling on pick an airline sign up for that airline so worth it yeah totally you know reap the rewards for crying out loud yeah but i have a buddy who travels southwest exclusively yeah and he travels so much that every year he gets a free travel companion to fly with him wherever he wants to go so southwest gives his wife essentially whenever they go on a trip she flies for free that's awesome so it's like hey free money yeah you know what if he never signed up for it he'd

never get that right so okay so pre-check there's another thing that's kind of like pre-check only uh you know like pre-check part two it's called clear okay I've seen that I think it's like 200 bucks a year or something like that I don't remember exactly how much it is but I'm signed up for that also so what that does is that allows you to go around the pre-check line and it is really fast you put your fingerprints and they do like some facial recognition verification of mission impossible stuff oh totally but you you actually can sign up if there's if your airport has clear there's a kiosk you just walk up to where it says clear and say i

want to sign up for this and then they make you put your fingerprints in they take your photo they verify your id and it totally changes a busy airport because so many travelers do have pre-check now yeah that you notice that yeah you may end up waiting in line. But I have clear. My wife has clear. My kids go through the clear line with us. Once they're 18, so I have two 18-year-olds now. I've got to sign them up for clear at some point. But it gets you to the front of the pre-check line.

And then if you have pre-check, it's like double whammy getting through security. You just kind of choose whatever's less busy and head that direction totally it's it it totally rocks it so i mean it's i love that so that's that's my next you know master hack for traveling is you know pre-check and clear a lot of people have one or the other yeah i just have tsa i but i always see clear when i'm waiting in the tsa pre-check line, I look over and see the clear, just clear. Yeah, there's nobody there, right? Yeah, it's clear.

Because you got to pay 200 bucks to do it. And I travel so much that I- It's worth it. Yeah, totally. So, okay, next one. I take headphones with me. I'm not one of those guys that I don't like to sit on the plane and just listen to that noise of the engine.

I don't typically watch TV or, you know, plug into whatever they're, they're trying to feed to you on the airplane. So I'll take my headphones. I have a couple of different types of headphones that, that I find really important. Noise canceling, love the noise canceling headphones. And there's a couple of types of noise canceling. There's active noise canceling and passive noise canceling headphones and uh there's a couple types of noise canceling there's active noise canceling and passive noise canceling and like passive noise canceling is just something that either covers your ear plugs your ear like ear plugs you know it's like sticking your fingers in your ear right so you can't hear anything um but they also like play music and stuff like that

you can connect it to your phone or or your eye your ipad or your computer or whatever via Bluetooth. So I've got a pair of those little in-the-ear passive noise canceling. They're, I think, Jabra Elite Sports or something like that. I don't know, a little plug to them. I love those things because I can't hear anything. It just really tunes you out. Totally, yeah, totally plugs your ears.

And then you can double tap them, and then it allows sound through. So if the flight attendant comes by and goes, hey, would you like something to drink? You can hear them say that. Oh, that's cool. You're not sitting there trying to read lips. Right, or having to pull them out. Yeah, totally.

Because you pull them out. A lot of these you pull out of your head, and they disconnect. Right. And you're like, oh, now you've got to go through the steps of reconnecting this thing. So I've got those, but I also have some of these over-the-ear noise canceling, the active noise canceling where they pump the white noise into your head. Right. And you can listen to your music.

So for longer trips, because those... More comfortable. Yeah, they're more comfortable, but it's a little easier if you're going a long trip because the little bitty ones, I think you get like three hours out of them. Oh, yeah. And some of my flights are like six hours. Uh- hours oh so there's other words you're sitting there like headphones are dead oh yeah gone but uh listen to the white noise on the airplane that's right that's it yeah the engine noise yay and the ding and the person next to you snoring and things like that so you know it gets personal that's right

so good headphones nice and then it's funny i'm like a headphone junkie so i actually have and then i have some apple airpods that i kind of you know i'll use in the car to and from as well as um you know while i'm wandering through the airport i'm not a fan of walking into a restaurant going hang on i got these big headphones on my head. But I'll take those off when I land. I'll throw in an AirPod. Because really what I'm trying to do during that time, I'm trying to make the most of it.

So I'm listening to podcasts like this one, Star of the Wind. Or I'm listening to an audio book because I'm going to take advantage of this time. This is me time and I'm going to use it. Nice. So headphones, baby. Headphones.

Good ones. Invest in something good. Another one, club membership. I have a club membership for United's Red Carpet Club. Okay. It's pricey, but I got to tell you, it is when you miss a flight, you don't have to go wait in the customer service line. You go into the club and they will rebook your flight for you. Ah, interesting.

Big tip, pro tip there. And here's the other thing. You can actually buy a club membership for one day if you want. So if your flight flights cancel and you go out and you see that line at customer service it goes like a mile and a half down the concourse and you're like there's no way in hell i'm gonna get through that in 24 hours so you go out and your your flights canceled you go out on the concourse and you see the customer service line you're like there's no way i'm gonna get in that line that's a mile and a half long in this day you know i'll I'll be stuck here when, you know, the guy with the broom and the mop's coming through going, excuse me, sir, can you move? I'm cleaning up around you.

So you need to be able to go get a ticket changed when your flight's canceled, right? Yeah. Go buy a one-day pass at a club. Oh, interesting. I was with my team, and we were in a Miami airport, and our flight got canceled. It was like 8 p.m and i i can't remember i think we're on like delta or something like that i don't remember exactly the airline and i look over and there's their club and i walk and i go can you guys change my ticket

and they go you remember the club i go how much is it to be a member of the club and they go uh 55 and i go here's 55 bucks can you change my ticket and they go absolutely sir welcome to the club just like that yeah so is that delta or united i think i think that one was delta okay because each one has their own yeah they all have their own but you can buy one day pass to any of them that's fantastic and i you're the second person that has brought this up to me recently i have another friend who has the united one and he says he gets like food and drink and like a comfy chair don't tell anybody yeah it's the you know it's like he like purposely gets the airport early so that he can just hang out in there.

Totally. Well, you walk in there and it's full of business people and they're on their laptop because you get free wifi, like some decent wifi. Yeah. It's not like the free wifi that kicks you off every couple of minutes. Barely download emails from.

Right. So you get some good wifi. They have restrooms that are clean, generally. And they also have refreshments. They have a little cheese tray and a little soup of the day type deal and the latte maker and stuff like that. And that's funny because one of the things that I really love about those, every now and then you'll see in the club, they have a little thing of pretzels or M&Ms or whatever

also. I throw a baggie, a little sandwich baggie, in my briefcase. So if I want to throw a few of those little things in there, kind of munch on them through the airport, yeah. They're like, score. That's right. Get your money's worth. Yeah.

Snack. Because I like to eat. It's kind of my way of winning is having a snack. You grab a banana or an apple or whatever. But yeah, they have food in those places. That's awesome. So you think about, how much is airport food? Pricey. Yeah, snack you grab a banana or an apple or whatever but yeah they have food in those places that's awesome so you think about how much is airport food pricey yeah yeah you go buy a banana it's like three dollars at the uh at the coffee shop yeah right but you can get that stuff in different airport clubs that's awesome or if you don't

want to sign up for one of those american express platinum if you have a platinum you can get into their centurion clubs but i think i think there's like five or six of those around the country okay so you got to be in one of the airports not as common not as common correct so airline club pro tip that is awesome that's a few of my my hacks and i do have one more hack that i use kind of stay healthy on these flights you read all the articles about how uh how much nastiness and bacteria and and you know germs and stuff i mean it's just gross um there are cesspools yeah exactly you almost don't want to talk about it you don't want to look at it but let's face it

there's germs at airports yeah lots do you want to hear one of the worst things at an airport i mean i i kind of do but i kind of don't okay i'm curious all right so uh it's the the tray that you put all your stuff in oh yeah the uh the tsa line i don't think they've washed those things since 9-11 when we started using them really i've read a study lately that that they are like little uh ebola petri dishes and That's gross. It's gross. So I try not to use those. I have my suitcase, my carry-on, and then I have my briefcase. I don't touch those plastic thingies that have all the germs on them. I'm one of those guys that takes Clorox wipes with me. You're that guy?

I am that guy. I will say this, though. I do not get sick much. Well, hey, there you have it. Yeah, so. Keep the germs away. Keep them this, though. I do not get sick much. Well, hey, there you have it. Yeah, so. Keep the germs away. Keep them away, buddy. And, you know, some emergency, a little vitamin C.

Stay healthy, right? That's right. Let's recap these. What is this? What is it? Top four tips? Yeah, we'll say four-ish. Four-ish.

Four-ish tips. Okay. You know, so pre-check and clear. You know, after you take your Uber to the airport. That's right. That's the ish. Uber your way. Yeah.

Packing cubes. Take the packing cubes. Headphones. Club memberships. So good. And then stay healthy, my friend. Stay healthy. Urgency, airborne.

That's it. Clorox wipes. Right on. All right. Clorox wipes. Right on. So, all right, until the next episode. Ladies and gentlemen, this is Adam Kantos from the 12th floor of REMAX headquarters overlooking beautiful Denver. And I want to tell you, start with a win. Thank you so much for joining us today.

Make sure to head over to startwithawin.com to get more great content. Please subscribe and rate the show on iTunes or wherever you get your podcasts. Follow Adam on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram. And remember, start with a win.