DICK BURKEMPER

Travel became Dick's career, and passion, in 1983 when he was offered a position as Regional Vice President at Intrav, an innovator and leader in deluxe world travel. His indoctrination trip included Vienna, Venice, Paris and the Orient Express, and at that point he knew he had found his niche.

In 1985 Dick was promoted to Senior Vice President and spent the next fourteen years building a team (all possessing that Midwest work ethic) and overseeing all aspects of Sales, Marketing, Sales Administration and Passenger Services at Intrav. A pioneer of affinity charters in its early days, Intrav was just developing the leading-edge concept of river cruising. Starting with the lower Danube, then the Netherlands, the Rhine, and later to Russia (the first tour operator to cruise passengers from Moscow to St. Petersburg); Dick's team pushed the company to the position of leadership in the river cruise market -- and the number one tour operator in the educational affinity (non-profits) arena. This was the basis for the great appreciation that Dick has for small ship cruising.

The company had always sold its product by direct mail and eschued the travel agent community. In many ways this community saw Intrav as an unwelcome competitor. In the mid nineties, Dick spearheaded an effort to bring his product to this group. His efforts culminated in becoming one of the very early preferred suppliers of Virtuoso. It was during this time that Dick became well acquainted with most of the other major tour operators in the U.S., and established relationships that continue to this day.

One of the true highlights of the time at Intrav was being the very first to offer travelers the unique experience of going on a twenty-one day trip around the world on the Concorde. In 1995, Dick was also part of the management team that took the company public. An experience he terms as "interesting".

Moving to Chicago in 1999, Dick became General Manager at Gohagan and Company. Also a strong player in the educational affinity market, Gohagan and company specialized in the top level of clients in this market, such as Yale, Harvard, The Smithsonian and others. Here, in addition to many of the same functions he performed previously, Dick gained experience in HR,  IT and other "behind the scenes" functions of the company. In addition to relishing his time with Gohagan, he thoroughly enjoyed the city of Chicago, and has become a willing ambassador of the Windy City.

In 2003 Dick returned to St. Louis and teamed up with Tom Pelizzaro, a friend of over twenty-five years (and co-worker at Intrav) to form this company, International Destination Marketing (IDM). The mission of IDM is simple. They work as facilitators --to bring the products and services of foreign travel providers to the tour operators in the U.S. who can best form a partnership to bring these products to market in this country.