• The TUGBBS forums are completely free and open to the public and exist as the absolute best place for owners to get help and advice about their timeshares for more than 30 years!

    Join Tens of Thousands of other Owners just like you here to get any and all Timeshare questions answered 24 hours a day!
  • TUG started 31 years ago in October 1993 as a group of regular Timeshare owners just like you!

    Read about our 31st anniversary: Happy 31st Birthday TUG!
  • TUG has a YouTube Channel to produce weekly short informative videos on popular Timeshare topics!

    Free memberships for every 50 subscribers!

    Visit TUG on Youtube!
  • TUG has now saved timeshare owners more than $24,000,000 dollars just by finding us in time to rescind a new Timeshare purchase! A truly incredible milestone!

    Read more here: TUG saves owners more than $24 Million dollars
  • Sign up to get the TUG Newsletter for free!

    Tens of thousands of subscribing owners! A weekly recap of the best Timeshare resort reviews and the most popular topics discussed by owners!
  • Our official "end my sales presentation early" T-shirts are available again! Also come with the option for a free membership extension with purchase to offset the cost!

    All T-shirt options here!
  • A few of the most common links here on the forums for newbies and guests!

Happy 30th Birthday to Timeshare Users Group

TUGBrian

Administrator
Joined
Mar 24, 2006
Messages
24,345
Reaction score
10,529
Location
Florida
tug30animated.gif


Its pretty rare that a website can claim a 30th birthday, yet here we are!

30 years ago this month my father and a group of other Timeshare Owners began to organize what was originally a Prodigy Bulletin Board System (where TUGBBS came from) composed of a handful of Timeshare owners discussion resorts and Timesharing, into what we now call TUG. TUG was/is actually one of the very first commercial sites on the Internet and the very first website period relating to Timeshares! TUG is older than any other Timeshare website (and the vast majority of ALL websites period!)

Over the last three decades, TUG has helped tens of thousands of timeshare owners with help and advice for buying, selling, renting, exchanging or otherwise making the most of their ownership!

As of 10/2023 the marketplace sits at 66 Million bucks in successfully sold or rented Timeshares by owners and $21 million bucks in confirmed cancellations by owners who found TUG in time to rescind a new purchase!

More than that though is the unimaginable value of information passed on and learned year after year through nothing more than timeshare owners helping each other understand and best use this product that comes with no instruction manual. I have even heard in the past TUG is the "owners manual" for Timeshares, and believe it to be true to this day.

Thank you to each and every one of you who has had a part in building, improving, running or participating in this community for the past 30 years, it is truly unique and a benefit to every single timeshare owners that finds it!

(note to also feel even older, the original Jurassic park was the number one movie in 1993)


To Celebrate, im going to give away a free membership for each and every day in October, so 30 freebies to give out to celebrate 30 years of TUG!

some will go to members of the Facebook group, some to our YouTube subscribers, and some for regular members here on the forum! (and yes, i know we are 6 days in, still gonna be 30 giveaways!) so stay tuned! Ill try to come up with some creative and fun ways to give out these free memberships to celebrate!



First giveaways will be to those who were participating in our livestream last weekend!

Current list of daily winners:

Day 1: time2save (livestream participant, won brand new TUG membership)
Day 2: moonstone (livestream participant, won 1 year renewal)
Day 3: claraj (livestream participant, won 1 year renewal)
Day 4: billymach4 (livestream participant, 1 year renewal)
Day 5: medicman1855 (livestream participant, 1 year renewal)
Day 6: curitiba_tapley (livestream participant, 1 year renewal)
Day 7: fb giveaway 1
Day 8: fb giveaway 2
day 9: youtube giveaway 1
day 10: youtube giveaway 2
day 11: youtube giveaway 3
 
Last edited:
Wow, 30 years old! I remember when TUG was just a few years old running around causing a lot of ruckus.

The number two billboard song for 1993 says it all for TUG. “Whoomp (There it is!).

Seriously though, what a great history. Congratulations on the special day.
 
Congratulations! And Thank You for all the good you have done (Plus a lot of entertainment)!
 
Happy 30th Birthday Tug and @TUGBrian , thank you for keeping your father's legacy alive. This board has been so helpful to me and I appreciate all of the advice and assistance I have received over the years. I'm also grateful to the friendships I've made, this is an amazing group of people that make up TUG.
 
Congratulations for 30 years of serving timeshare owners! I haven’t been around 30 years but I’d guess about 25 and visiting TUG continues to be a regular part of my day.
 
Congrats. Thanks for the effort and another BIG thanks to the folks who keep the out of bounds posts under control :banana: :whooopie:
 
Hauʻoli Lā Hānau TUG!!!! shaka
 
View attachment 82166

Its pretty rare that a website can claim a 30th birthday, yet here we are!

30 years ago this month my father and a group of other Timeshare Owners began to organize what was originally a Prodigy Bulletin Board System (where TUGBBS came from) composed of a handful of Timeshare owners discussion resorts and Timesharing, into what we now call TUG. TUG was/is actually one of the very first commercial sites on the Internet and the very first website period relating to Timeshares! TUG is older than any other Timeshare website (and the vast majority of ALL websites period!)

Over the last three decades, TUG has helped tens of thousands of timeshare owners with help and advice for buying, selling, renting, exchanging or otherwise making the most of their ownership!

As of 10/2023 the marketplace sits at 66 Million bucks in successfully sold or rented Timeshares by owners and $21 million bucks in confirmed cancellations by owners who found TUG in time to rescind a new purchase!

More than that though is the unimaginable value of information passed on and learned year after year through nothing more than timeshare owners helping each other understand and best use this product that comes with no instruction manual. I have even heard in the past TUG is the "owners manual" for Timeshares, and believe it to be true to this day.

Thank you to each and every one of you who has had a part in building, improving, running or participating in this community for the past 30 years, it is truly unique and a benefit to every single timeshare owners that finds it!

(note to also feel even older, the original Jurassic park was the number one movie in 1993)


To Celebrate, im going to give away a free membership for each and every day in October, so 30 freebies to give out to celebrate 30 years of TUG!

some will go to members of the Facebook group, some to our YouTube subscribers, and some for regular members here on the forum! (and yes, i know we are 6 days in, still gonna be 30 giveaways!) so stay tuned! Ill try to come up with some creative and fun ways to give out these free memberships to celebrate!



First giveaways will be to those who were participating in our livestream last weekend!

Current list of daily winners:

Day 1: time2save (livestream participant, won brand new TUG membership)
Day 2: moonstone (livestream participant, won 1 year renewal)
Day 3: claraj (livestream participant, won 1 year renewal)
Day 4: billymach4 (livestream participant, 1 year renewal)
Day 5: medicman1855 (livestream participant, 1 year renewal)
Day 6: curitiba_tapley (livestream participant, 1 year renewal)
HAPPY BIRTHDAY TUG. Brian, your dad was an absolute genius to have created one of the first social media forums. The value you, TUG and its TUGGERS bring to the town square is immeasurable. We are very grateful for the service provided.:cheer:
 
Happy birthday, TUG! I remember Prodigy! 30 years ago, I was in college and volunteering with a youth development organization. The org held the contract to video, broadcast live, and record our local city council meetings--all of which was done by the students as civic, service, and workforce development programming. The program used Prodigy for some things. Good times, good times....

It's weird to think about the fact that I've been here for 12 years now. I am just 6 posts away from my 3,000th post. :)
 
Thank you for your time and effort in educating all of us regarding timeshare ownership. A great achievement!
 
Happy Birthday to TUG!
I’ve been a member on and off since the beginning. Really got into timesharing because of tug.
Lot of advice and fun vacations with our timeshares. Bought and sold ( given away) most of my weeks thru tug.
Getting down to just 2 timeshares. In the past have had 10 weeks at different resorts, some I never stayed in but most have used or exchanged. We bought our first timeshare in 1981 and never looked back. Hope to enjoy these last 2 for many more years.
Safe travels!
Terry Castiglia ( Silentg)
 
Thank you TUG for basically being a public service community. I know I've received valuable information on TUG and directed hundreds of people to the site when they had questions or needed help. You always have been and continue to be the best timeshare resource.
 
and giveaways 8, 9 and 10 for youtube subscribers!

 
Thankful for TUG for many reasons! Thanks for all you do, @TUGBrian (and for lots of great advice over the years and for my TUG friends).

Happy 30th Birthday, TUG!
 
Happy 30th tug.
With all the $ you saved me over the years I could have gotten you something really nice.
Instead I bought 7 more time shares!
 
I bought my first timeshare, resale, in 1991. One of our first trades was to Fairfield Glade, we liked it so much we wanted to buy a specific week resale. The real estate didn’t have week 13, so when we got home I searched online. This was either 1994 or 1995. Dial up internet on a primitive computer didn’t work very well, but I am pretty sure I found a week for sale on Tug, but the seller never responded. However I didn’t join until after 2001, when I met a tugger on a 12 week timeshare trip we took.
 
Top