Getaways for Power Trippers

Want to hit the fast track in the ‘90s? Start packing your bags.

Seems that anybody who is anybody is headed for faraway places, and not just for the chance to snooze by themselves on a white-sand beach. No way. They’re leaving it all behind to be with people of their own kind to learn .

Take developer Peter B. Rothschild of Newport Beach. Last weekend, the CEO of Rothschild Industries left town to pave the way for about 250 members of the Young Presidents Organization to attend a “university” beginning near Montego Bay, Jamaica, on Sunday.

Members, who must be no older than 40 when they become top gun of a company (typically, a company with a minimum of $5 million in annual sales) will attend classes during the day and spend evenings partying at the Half Moon Bay Club.

The learn-then-play concept is nothing new for the Young Presidents Organization, founded in 1950. But it’s a travel concept--call it power-tripping--that is being used more and more by local leadership groups. Doors open wider when movers and shakers arrive, en masse, so why not go for it?

The reason doors open, says Craig McDaniel, director of marketing and communications for the organization in Dallas, is that members have access to the people who control those doors and access to the kind of experts the organization likes to present at their “universities.”

“We’re known for drawing the creme de la creme of business and politics as ‘faculty members,’ ” McDaniel says. (Former President Richard M. Nixon was invited to speak at the Jamaica conference. Young Presidents Organization member Al Baldwin of Emerald Bay offered to fly him there in his private jet. But Nixon’s phlebitis condition prevented him from making the trip.)

Influential women on the move include members of the Angels of the Arts, a support group that has raised $2.5 million for the Orange County Performing Arts Center since it was founded in 1983. “We’re looking to do cultural-educational trips because it gives our members an opportunity to see theater and art from another perspective,” says Angels President Judie Argyros, wife of Forbes 400 developer George Argyros.

On the drawing board for the Angels: a trip to Manhattan that would include visits to art museums, theaters, and behind-the-scenes peeks at such Big Apple landmarks as Radio City Music Hall.

“We did a survey with our client base last fall,” says Linda McIntosh, president of International Travel Specialties in Irvine. “We asked them: ‘If you could go anywhere in the world, where would you go?’

“Sixty percent of them told us they weren’t interested in just taking trips, they wanted to travel with a purpose. If they were going to go to Nepal, for example, they wanted to go with a special-interest group eager to explore Nepal’s culture.”

McIntosh, who is helping the Angels plan their trip, thinks the reason local power groups are beginning to travel together is because they are maturing. “They’ve joined a group with goals they believe in. They’ve found they have loads in common. It only follows they would want to travel with them,” she says.

Besides the chance to explore the arts, the Angels would enjoy the chance to “get to know each other and their spouses better,” Argyros says, “to talk Angel shoptalk, to tell a good joke or two. It’s the quality time together that ultimately sells the idea of a cultural trip away from home.”

“People love to travel with friends,” says Ginny Ueberroth, co-chairwoman of the Los Angeles Music Center’s $25,000-per-person Silver Anniversary trip to Lanai, Hawaii next month. “I think some people have a little trouble with traveling. Being with friends and being taken care of on a tour makes it more comfortable.”

The trip, which will mark the grand opening of David Murdock’s new 102-room Lodge at Koele, will offer more fun than education (sunset receptions, garden teas, barbecues, helicopter rides, formal dinners). But the happy campers, who will include Sidney Sheldon, Henry Mancini, Dina Merrill and Michael York, will relax knowing that their megabucks helped educate others about the theater arts.

“One of my jobs was getting locals from Orange County to go on the trip,” says Ueberroth, who lives with her husband, Peter Ueberroth, in Emerald Bay. “But most of the people I know were loyal to the Orange County Performing Arts Center. I do think the interest between the two centers has increased. And I think this is important. We’re going to have to be working together to attract certain groups and programs.”

Ueberroth doffs her hat to Murdock. “It was a great idea, inviting donors to his island. He’s done so much for the Music Center. It’s going to be marvelous.”

About 25 local movers and shakers are lining up to go to Germany and France on March 10 with Don R. Roth, chairman of the Orange County Board of Supervisors. Roth has invited influential friends and associates to join him when he inspects high-speed train technology, which could be used on a rail line between Anaheim and Las Vegas.

Developer Gus Owen, president of the Lincoln Club, is trying to find room in his and wife Kathryn Thompson’s hectic schedule to make the trip. “It would be exciting to see the innovation other countries have come up with to solve their transportation problems,” he says. For Owen, the plus of power trips is the chance to “meet with people you would not have the ability to meet with if you were on a trip by yourself.”

“Bringing transportation experts together for one person would be difficult. But with a number of community leaders present, people have a greater reason to sit down and chat, explain how they accomplished what they did.

“When you have powerful people arriving together at one time, it’s rare that you can’t get other powerful people together at the same time.”