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Meet Michael Del Toro of Five Diamond Club® LLC

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Today we’d like to introduce you to Michael Del Toro.

Hi Michael, thanks for sharing your story with us. To start, maybe you can tell our readers some of your backstory.
After helping my parents at their travel agencies in Brownsville, San Antonio, and Cancun, after school every day as a child and teenager, I developed a passion for helping others travel the world. At age 17, when I graduated from Lamar High School in Arlington, I started working at American Airlines at the Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport as a bilingual passenger service agent, and after soon becoming a Customer Service Manager at age 18, I found a niche opportunity, so that my airline colleagues and I can take full advantage of the free flight privileges provided to us by the airline. Airline employee wages were not much at the time, so it was very difficult to actually use those travel privileges, as hotel, cruise, and resort rates were rising. After learning that the hospitality and cruise industry had wholesale pricing, I realized I could offer to them the ability to fill up their empty rooms, and through our collective buying power with over 600,000 airline employees, among the main carriers, I could use that as leverage to negotiate wholesale and interline rates. I had the opportunity to attend a Dallas Citizens Council event through a special invitation by mentor, scholarship sponsor and president of that council, at the time, Dr. Jan LeCroy, and I had the opportunity at that event and other chamber of commerce events to follow, to meet C-suite level executives of Fortune 500 companies in the global travel and tourism industry, including my then Chairman and CEO of American Airlines, Bob Crandall and his successor Don Carty. It then occurred to me to develop a relationship with the hospitality and cruise line C-Suite level executives. I developed Unlimited Vacations, which would later turn into Five Diamond Club, as an employee-only benefit to offer to my airline colleagues throughout the United States of America. My parents, Alejandro and Laura, were instrumental in supporting me at the beginning, and I give them credit as the other two co-founders, as I had their leadership, mentorship, and travel industry experience to be able to have a successful start-up company, along with their blessing and financial investment. Juggling a start-up company at age 18, in 1998, when I founded the company, along with attending Mountain View College in Dallas to maintain my Chancellor Emeritus Scholarship provided to me by Dr. Jan and Dr. Nancy LeCroy, and later transferring on a full Chancellor’s Scholarship provided by Chancellor Dr. Michael Ferrari at Texas Christian University, was very challenging, but I accomplished, not only having a successful business, but also a successful educational career earning my high school diploma at age 16, with a Business Executive Internship opportunity at the Texas Rangers Baseball Club executive offices, Southwestern Bell Telephone Company sales and marketing management department, and Glenn W. A. Holley & Associates Law Firm, along with an exciting Austin internship during college at State Representative Dale B. Tillery’s office at the State Capitol Building along the side of Governor George W. Bush, Jr., and earning my Associate’s degree in business from Dallas County Community College District’s Mountain View College at age 18, along with my Bachelor of Business Administration in Marketing and Communications Certification at age 20 from the Neeley School of Business at TCU. I was blessed to have been offered the opportunity to start working at the Federal Bureau of Investigation at age 20 on January 9, 2001, and after resigning from American Airlines on May 4, 2001, I saw a niche opportunity to start offering, as an employee-only benefit, my membership program of Unlimited Vacations to government employees during my own time, along with helping our nation at the FBI in high-level investigations that included HIDTA High-Intensity Drug Trafficking Area and OCDETF Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Forces cases. I still, to this date, maintain a lifetime relationship with the FBI, through my involvement as a lifetime member of the FBI Dallas Citizens Academy Alumni Association and InfraGard membership, along with other law enforcement agencies throughout the country. When involved in the educational and education administration field, on and off, from 2003 to 2017, I saw a niche opportunity, once again, to offer as an employee-only benefit to educators in many school districts, my Unlimited Vacations membership. In 2017, as my dad had passed away in 2012, I decided I needed to dedicate more time to my company for it to grow, and I decided to retire from all my various activities to dedicate 100% to growing my business. I had already opened an office in Fort Worth, Texas to initiate serving the general public in the direct-to-consumer world at La Gran Plaza in the offices section above the mall, along with a kiosk at the mall to attract clients. Between 2018 and 2023, I opened offices in Plano, Southlake, Grapevine, and Cancun. In 2019, Five Diamond Club, was born, as a division. I later registered Five Diamond Club as a trademark and limited liability company, to position it as the parent company of Unlimited Vacations, My Vacation Benefits, and the other divisions and brands. Headquartered in Grapevine, Texas, Five Diamond Club® LLC, we now have the world’s largest network of accommodations with over 31.5 million accommodations at 9.5 million+ properties, including over 1 million hotels, 400,000+ brands, 32,000+ resorts, all major cruise lines, over 5,000 airlines, all major vehicle rental agencies, tours, excursions, theme parks, water parks, sport events, concerts, shows, restaurants, stores, online shopping, and services at exclusive member-only pricing through our various membership offerings direct to the consumer on our website at https://fivediamondclub.com and B2B as a client, member and employee benefit in our wholesale market globally, with our website having the feature of translating it into 249 languages and accepting over 100 currencies of the world. We have an incredible creative director who is doing wonders with video creation using artificial intelligence technology, my significant other, Noemí, who works alongside me, with lots of drive and passion to keep growing Five Diamond Club. We pride ourselves on providing exceptional service, and we are very proud of our five-star reviews on Google and Better Business Bureau, along with our A+ rating BBB accreditation. We have a passion for helping others, and we love supporting charities and noble causes, volunteering our time in many efforts, and are a multi-generational, Christian family, privately-owned business that has the vision to be the next household item in the globe to be able to offer affordable travel to the entire population of the globe, as vacations help people prevent many stress-related terminal or fatal diseases. Our company never profits on reservations like the majority of travel companies; we pass on all the savings to our members and only profit a nominal amount on the membership for being part of the club. We are changing the lives and lifestyles of many, and we want every person to have the best experiences to increase their quality time spent with their loved ones, through offering them spectacular affordable luxury vacations throughout the world, as well as offering the high-demand clientele a VIP experience, like no other, where they can invest once, and indulge forever, with a one-time investment and having a legacy of permanent, multi-generational, all-included ultimate luxury experience at secluded mansions, mega yachts, ultra-luxury resorts, luxury hotels, private jet service, exotic car experiences, and more as described at https://fivediamondclub.com/vip.

Alright, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
The beginning was challenging, as with any new startup company, but the struggles and challenges thereafter have been nonstop. With many crises in the world that affect the economy, we have faced many challenges that we have fortunately overcome. At the end of 1999, when everyone feared traveling due to the potential technology threat of Y2K, many thought the world was going to end, or that they couldn’t fly anywhere because they feared the systems would crash, so we had a very tough holiday season in the business. After September 11, 2001, many feared traveling due to the tragic terrorist attacks that had happened, a long difficult time during that period with hardly any business coming through. Other crises include other years when epidemics, pandemics, wars, and financial market crashes have occurred throughout the 28 years of our company history. COVID19, was the worse of all, with us facing challenges like never before, which is when we decided to start offering also every-day exclusive member-only pricing with every-day services throughout the USA and Canada, such as at restaurants, online shopping, stores, services, movie theaters, gas stations, and day passes for hotels, resorts, and spas, as many were not traveling. We are blessed, however, to have a very high client loyalty due to our exceptional service and great value, that we offer to our members.

Thanks for sharing that. So, maybe next you can tell us a bit more about your business?
Five Diamond Club® is the company that offers the world’s largest selection of accommodations, cruise lines, and other travel-related services as a one-stop-shop, and has the best wholesale pre-negotiated pricing that is offered to our members through unpublished rates within their membership, very conveniently and in a user-friendly online member portal. Unlike the rest of the profit-hungry huge travel corporations that currently control the market, we do care about our clients and we do not profit on the reservations like the rest of the corporations, in the oligopoly travel industry that we have today. We offer exceptional service, with personal attention to detail, to make all experiences memorable and cherishable. We offer the best solution to businesses, companies, and organizations to create loyalty and attract clients, employees, and members through our incredible lifestyle benefits, rewards, privileges, perks, and incentives programs, which help them also reduce overall operating costs and increase revenue, profits or donations. We offer the travel advisor community, travel partner programs that help them have the best competitive advantage over others to increase their profits and offerings, as well as unique incentives to increase sales. Additionally, we offer the VIP Ultimate Luxury experiences for the highest demanding clientele with exclusive complimentary features, amenities, and exclusive access to secluded, curated top 1% properties of the world. Finally, for those that want a permanent lifestyle of living at mansions, cruises, resorts, mega yachts, with personalized service, and unique experiences including space travel, private jets, African safaris, Antarctica expeditions, World Cruises, and more, we offer VIP Diamond Society Permanent Memberships in which they Invest Once, and Indulge Forever.

Is there any advice you’d like to share with our readers who might just be starting out?
My advice is to get into business with the proper mindset of being a leader, having passion for what you do, believing and putting your faith in God, prioritizing your health and family, giving back to the community, and of course, success will follow with your dedication and your heart in the right place of helping others. Disregard negativity and envy from others. Look for away to start with something that will give you passive income, as I wish, I would have started my monthly and annual subscriptions from the beginning. This business model, can help you create a legacy to leave to your generations to come.

Pricing:

  • Travel Club Subscriptions ranging from Free to $27.99 monthly and higher, Free Trials available
  • Business Incentives Programs starting at $99.99 monthly
  • Lifestyle Employee, Client & Member Benefits, Privileges, Perks, Rewards, and Incentives Programs at wholesale pricing and customized private label offerings (contact us for pricing)
  • Lifestyle and Vacation Club comprehensive membership with 125+ benefits starting at $997 signup plus $597 monthly
  • VIP Diamond Society Permanent-Living Memberships starting at $1 Million

Contact Info:

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