FIT Gesellschaft für gesundes Reisen mbH

Placement organization

Name of organization: FIT Gesellschaft für gesundes Reisen mbH
Town/city: Frankfurt am Main
Country: Duitsland
Website: http://www.fitreisen.de

Student

Name of student: Lorena Schuth

Specialist area: ITTI
Placement period: 2012-2013

Information about placement organization

Type of organization: Tour operator
Organization’s activities: Specialist tour operator for health and wellness travel. They are aiming at being very exclusive and different compared to the big industry players. They have many E-Tourism and Marketing activities taking place. The resorts and hotels they have in the program are rather exclusive and focus on Spa, Ayurveda, Medical Wellness holidays and so on.
Target group of the organization: Mainly elderly and wealthy people who are interested in health and wellness products
Company culture: (…)
Number of employees: 40
Dress code: casual (but semi-formal for business meetings)
Did the organization meet the agreements you made beforehand? Yes

Information about your placement

In which department(s) are you working? 3 Managing directors; Departments: Product Management, Sales, Purchase, Customer advisory, Accounts. I worked in Product Management (& Acquisition)
Brief description of your daily activities: Catalogue production (comparing prices, writing texts …), communication with hotel partners
Brief description of your company assignment: Analysis of British market and strategies for implementation of internationalization project combined with marketing strategy of company and how to improve the strategy for entering the British market
Comment briefly on your supervision by the organization: You need to show that you have the skills to do the work and sometimes it is very stressful because you really need to get used to the pace. You have to be able to work very independently. However, the company supervisor is always there to help and to answer questions and it is important for him that the way you work is efficient, so he aims at optimizing every process within the company.

Requirements for students on placement

What kind of personal skills are required for this placement? independent, stress-proof, teamplayer, ambitious, well-organized
Additional company requirements for this placement? Word, Excel (very important, since almost everything is filed in Excel sheets. However, they are now adding databases. You do not have to be an expert in Excel, but you should take a look at it again before your placement at FIT)
English: Advanced
Spanish:
French:
German: Mother tongue
Italian:
Other languages:

The trip

Mode of transport to reach your destination: car (my hometown is a 1 ½ hour drive from Frankfurt)

Accommodation

How did you arrange your accommodation? I was lucky enough to find a great, central and not too expensive accommodation very quickly through a good friend who lives in Frankfurt. However, a popular way to find an accommodation in Frankfurt is www.wg-gesucht.de Be aware of the fact that Frankfurt is a very expensive city when it comes to rent and it might be hard to find something.
How did you go to work every day? public transport (U-Bahn) or by foot

Visa / work permit / vaccinations

Do you need a visa? No
Do you need a work permit? No
How did you arrange the necessary documents:
How much time did it take to arrange the necessary documents?
Did you need certain vaccinations? No

Language course

Did you take a language course before you started your placement? No
Would you recommend to have a language course prior to this placement? n/a

The costs in euros

Travelling expenses (e.g. return ticket): € –
Accommodation (monthly): € 375,00
Local transport (monthly): € 70,00 / 80,00
General costs of living (monthly): € 200,00
Costs of visa: €
Costs of work permit: €
What did the company pay for/to you? 600,00 per month

Culture

How did you prepare for the country’s culture?
I am German myself
Did the culture of the country influence your performance during the placement in any way? No

Future students on placement

Future students are free to contact me for further information: Yes
My e-mail address: lorenaschuth@googlemail.com

Other information

Recommendations on what to do and what not to do: Do not be afraid to ask questions. Especially during the catalogue production phase everything is very stressful and the employees and the supervisor do not always have time to explain everything in detail. Hence, it is very important that you ask if you do not understand something. Furthermore you should be creative and give recommendations, bring in your own ideas! Tell them what you would like to do and to learn.
expect to work longer than your normal working hours. It is not a must to stay longer from time to time but all of the employees do it during stressful phases. It is your own choice.

Leisure possibilities in the city/surroundings of where the placement took place: Frankfurt is a nice, but rather small city for such an international and popular German town. It is nice that you do not always have to use public transport but can walk to a lot of the sights and places, since the most important things are centered around the same area. There are a lot of nice bars around there, which I did not expect, because Frankfurt was known to me as a “banker city” where you have to be very posh when going out. Frankfurt is also great for shopping and it is extremely international. You can get great food from all cuisines you can imagine and you hear lots of different languages on the streets. There are also many parks within the city.
I cannot really say anything about the surroundings of the company because they are going to move in August, so if you are going to do your placement there, you will be in a different office than I am. However, the place they are moving to is easy to reach by public transport in the Eastern part of the city.

Media

Youtube link Youtube placement video link