Wimco.com affords clients the opportunity to make their own online reservations for specific villas with follow-up confirmation within 24 hours.

NEWPORT, RI, November 2001 -- Luxury Villa and Hotel Reservations Company Launches Proprietary Technology With Caribbean Collection in Time for Fall/Winter 2001-2002: Additional International Destinations To Be Secured Through System Within Year.

The technically astute WIMCO, whose www.wimco.com recently received a “Best of the Web” accolade from Forbes.com and kudos from Town & Country as one of the best travel web sites, has scored again.

Now clients can browse www.wimco.com for their dream villa, determine immediately if it is available when they want to travel and then make an on-the-spot, on-line, reservation. Within 24 hours (8 a.m.-8 p.m. weekdays and 9 a.m. –1 p.m. Saturdays, EST) a WIMCO personal travel consultant confirms the reservation request and answers any additional questions.

“This is the first time that villa rental programs have had the capability to give such specific personalized service to their clients. Many companies say they have on-line reservations, but then have to check with suppliers later, whereas Wimco maintains real-time villa availability.” said Janis Gordon, Director of Sales and Marketing for the Newport, RI-based luxury villa and hotel reservations company. She said that the on-line function is proprietary to WIMCO. The application is launching in time for the winter 2002 season with WIMCO’s exclusive villas in the Caribbean.

“We will expand the concept to other international destinations within the year,” she said.

“Most of our clients have become web savvy. They expect to find a villa that will suit their needs on the web site. Many already know what will meet their needs and just want to reach a decision more conveniently. Booking on-line is for this kind of client. We still offer the personal consultation and top notch customer service to the client who wants to be guided to the villa which is the right fit.” Gordon said.

Clients can sort by island and/or destination, price, number of bedrooms and more. Each villa has interior and exterior of photos and descriptive materials with a calendar graphic of open dates.

“Our web site already shows the pricing and details of WIMCO’s extensive and exclusive St. Barts inventory,” Gordon says. “And now our clients can get into the mix as well by hopping on the website, making plans, reserving a villa and being assured within 24 hours that their plans are confirmed. WIMCO’s villa website is designed to help the client select first a prime destination in the Caribbean or in Europe. From the destination, it guides the viewer into selecting villas by determining the number of rooms required. This thorough, dynamic villa site is database driven and is constantly updated. It defines seasonal and peak pricing, gives a room-by-room description and a range of photos on each villa, with literally all the information needed to make a wise choice. Each villa comes with a stamp of approval from WIMCO staff who have visited each villa and explored the cultural attributes of the surrounding region.

WIMCO offers over 1,000 luxury villas and distinctive hotels and resorts internationally in such select areas as Italy’s Umbria region, France’s Provence and St. Tropez and elsewhere in the Caribbean (680 villas on twelve islands including St. Barts, St. Martin, Mustique, Nevis, Anguilla, Barbados and others).

For further information, write WIMCO, P.O. Box 1461, Newport, RI 02840; Tel: 401-849-8012, Fax: 401-847-6290