TRAVEL INSIDER : Hotel, Cruise Discounts Await Reunion-goers : Groups: Planning a family gathering? A guarantee of more business can get you special treatment in return. Resorts and dude ranches are also popular choices.

Norman Klivans of Cleveland, Ohio, will soon be 75. To celebrate his birthday, he and his family are looking for a getaway gathering destination somewhere between Los Angeles and San Francisco, where his sons live. But where?

He didn’t know, so he wrote me. And I didn’t know, so I made a few calls and found that Klivans is part of a large market whose members may not realize their own strength.

Every year, by the thousands, families plan getaway gatherings, couples stage anniversary celebrations, and shipmates and classmates scheme to assemble reunions. Many of them have trouble putting the proper circumstances together, and understandably so.

The factors an organizer has to consider are likely to outnumber the guests. Can everyone afford it? Can the place provide privacy and accessibility? Will the staff give special attention to special gatherings?

A little travel-industry jargon may go a long way in easing those worries. The acronym to remember is SMERF, and among tourism people, it refers to the social, military, educational, religious and fraternal groups that get special treatment from hotels, cruise ships and resorts. If you can guarantee a certain amount of business for your host by bringing such a group, you can probably bargain for some discounts in return.

Many larger families have figured this out. They hold reunions annually, and have committees and parliamentary procedures for the choosing of locations. Some families send out requests for proposals to several hotels and play them against each other.

“It’s wild,” said Karen Burke, group services coordinator for Embassy Suites Hotels, recalling some family discount-seekers’ strategies. But, she added, “it’s really a steady flow of business for us.”

At Club Med (800-CLUBMED), now running six “family villages” among its sites in North America, spokeswoman Edwina Arnold said group gatherings seem to be increasing. Arnold noted that widely scattered families may be more likely to convene at a getaway location than at someone’s home.

Her favorite family reunion group is led by a 70-something man who annually brings an extended family of more than 40, accumulated over the course of three marriages. In recent years, the group has included his current mother-in-law, who is a little younger than he is.

“He put up a trust fund so this can go on after he has died,” Arnold added.

Cruises and resort sites, where a wide range of activities are available, are popular choices. Dude ranches, though sometimes costly, are another increasingly popular option.

In the case of the Klivans clan, the goal is scenery, hiking, swimming and recreation--a place where the young grandchildren can do some running around. They don’t want a theme park. They do want kitchens and “very comfortable” accommodations, and they have some money to spend. The last time the family tried something like this, several years ago, the Klivanses took three cottages at the luxurious Auberge du Soleil in the Napa Valley.

“It was lovely,” recalled Alice Klivans, Norman’s wife. “But we want something a little different, and perhaps not so expensive. That place was a killer.”

Fortunately, the Klivans have time to mull their possibilities; the big 75th birthday arrives next August. But plenty of groups don’t work so far in advance, nor do they stay alert to all the subtleties of SMERFdom. To them, I can now pass along some advice.

* Don’t confine yourself to land. Cruises are an increasingly common choice. Family gatherings and common-interest groups are “one of the fastest-growing trends we’ve seen in the business,” said Rich Skinner, spokesman for the Seattle-based Holland America line (800-426-0327; for groups, 800-426-0329). “They can have as much togetherness as they wish, but also have all the separation they want, within one place,” said Skinner. “You can have your cake and eat it, too.” For groups of 10 or more, Holland America usually offers discounts of 10%-25%, depending on the season and size of the group, Skinner said. At Los Angeles-based Crystal Cruises (800-446-6645), the group discounts are comparable. The drawback of cruising is the price tag; a seven-day cruise is likely to cost at least $1,000 per person. One way to stay nautical but cut costs is a houseboat rental. Those arrangements entail more responsibility but offer more privacy and the chance to plan your own meals and itinerary. One popular houseboat rental company is Forever Resorts (800-255-5561), which in the West rents 31 boats on Lake Mead and 11 more on Lake Mohave, both on the Nevada-Arizona border southeast of Las Vegas. Each boat is 54 feet long, sleeps 10 and includes a VCR and waterslide among its amenities. Next year’s prices for a three-night rental will run from $700 to $1,700, depending on the season.

* Be sure there’s a consensus on costs. Especially with unemployment running high, reunion planners need to consider the economic stresses many Americans are facing. When travel agent Kathy Slankard of the World Travel Bureau in Santa Ana counsels big family groups, she said, “I try to give them several different choices of places, and try to sit everybody down and have them work out a budget together.” She also recommended that any reunion group begin planning a year in advance.

* If you’re going to book a hotel, look for dates when occupancy will be low. If you’re planning a fall or winter family gathering, it might make sense to consider Thanksgiving. None of the relatives will have to cook or clean, and in many areas low demand pushes hotel room prices down. If your family wanted 10 rooms at the San Rafael Embassy Suites in the San Francisco Bay area over Thanksgiving and booked two months in advance, for instance, group services supervisor Burke estimated that you could get a rate of about $79 per suite per night--a substantial savings from the standard rate of $129 nightly for the same units. (Embassy Suites: 800-362-2779.)

* Find out how many rooms it takes to get a group discount. Before they give SMERF discounts, most hotels and cruise lines require that the group will be a certain size. Embassy Suites, Holiday Inn, and many other hotel chains make 10 rooms their cutoff point for what are often substantial discounts. (For cruise lines, the figure is often 10 beds. For Club Med, the figure is 20 people.)

The discount can make a big difference. For instance: At the Redding Holiday Inn, less than an hour from Mt. Lassen and Mt. Shasta in Northern California, the standard rate for a double room is $75 nightly. Sales Director Lisa Shields said she often gives discounts of 20% to groups that take 10 rooms or more. Thus, it could be cheaper to rent 10 rooms (at a discounted pre-tax cost of $600 nightly) than to rent nine (at an undiscounted pre-tax cost of $675). That particular circumstance is unlikely--there is usually some other kind of discount available to smaller groups--but hotel professionals agree that it pays to ask.

* Investigate the destination’s offerings for kids. In recent years, hotels at all price levels have added features aimed at luring more families with children. When the goal of the occasion is to give the grown-ups a chance to catch up with each other, those children’s diversions can be invaluable.

At the more affordable end of the spectrum (rates often under $75 nightly), many Holiday Inns (800-465-4329 or 800- 633-8464 for groups of 10 rooms or more) feature “Holidomes”--which include indoor swimming pools as well as (often) video games, shuffleboard, ping-pong and other young people’s attractions.

At the more luxurious end (rates begin at $190 nightly), the Ojai Valley Inn & Country Club (800-422-6524) 75 miles north of L.A., runs a Camp Ojai program for children ages 3-14 during the holiday season. For $15 per child daily, inn employees supervise crafts, books, sports and videos from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. every day.

By the time I called the Klivans household in Ohio last week to report my findings, the family had done a fair share of research already, and the decision seemed to be largely made. If you choose, you can take it as an indication of the economic mood of the country. Instead of returning to Napa--where Auberge du Soleil’s prices now run $295 and up--the Klivanses have cut their budget in half. They’re leaning toward the $144-a-night-and-up (subject to availability) Crown Sterling Suites Mandalay Beach Resort in Oxnard (800-433-4600).