Sundance Travel: Chip Kilby, Director of Marketing

Born and raised in Montclair, New Jersey, graduated Montclair Public High School in 1984 and attended the University of Florida where he received his BA in Business Administration. Chip lived in Atlanta for awhile before accepting a position with Marriott Vacation Club International as a Marketing Coordinator in Desert Springs, California. I achieved $350,000 in volume, booked 110 guests, with an average volume per guest of $3,000, in eight months as a Team Leader. Then I was transferred to their Park City, Utah Ski Property to work what they call their Two Step Marketing Program. My responsibilities were to pre-qualify guests in Salt Lake City to an informative, 30 minute presentation; then send them to Park City for a full tour. I sent a total of 230 guests who spent a total of $736,000. After that I was asked to take over a telemarketing department that was in disarray and turned them around to end the year with almost $4,000,000 in volume.

After almost two years on the west coast, Marriott opened a new and exciting resort in Fort Lauderdale, FL. I was the “jack-of-all-trades” at this new resort. First, I was in charge of OPC and Special Event Marketing. As that developed I was asked to start a small Owner Referral department and an Owner Services coordinator to coincide with the department. During the third year I conducted Owner Services Seminars to local and visiting owners to answer questions and solicit referrals. I regularly did seminars on marketing tours for Marriott and the two other South Florida resorts: Villas at Doral and Ocean Point, West Palm Beach. I had received three annual awards while in the South Florida market, including Marriott’s coveted MVCI Award of Excellence in 1997 for achievement of excellence, regardless of profession or task. As Fort Lauderdale sold out, I was transferred to the MVCI corporate office in Orlando, FL. Here I was to head-up centralization of telemarketing and put together an Owner Referral program for the Florida region and the South East US regions. My team broke records in 2000 and 2001 for selling 8,324 packages in 2000, which is 155% above budget. In 2001 the Florida region accumulated 4,836 packages, which is 140% above budget. My department was the highest producing department in a call center of over 500 phones. With the vacation industry reeling from the tragedy of 9/11 and after ten years with Marriott I decided it was time for a change. I had a good reputation in the industry and had an opportunity with some other industry associates to try to start-up a new concept they had developed. After a year of this, a head hunter who specialized in the vacation industry introduced me to Mr. Dowd. Mr. Dowd wanted me to start a Lead Generation department and I have been his Director of Marketing since 2003. We generate close to a million leads. I oversee Milwaukee, Chicago, Philadelphia, Harrisburg, Wilkes-Barre, Princeton, NJ and Rockaway, NJ.