A tour is usually designed by an official tour organizer. People who go on that tour go to places, at times, and by means set by the organizer. GeoPassage.com of Austin, Texas, promotes a different concept to the market that buys travel services via the internet -- you organize your own tour to suit your tastes but they save you almost all the trouble of doing research about places and facilities, by providing at your finger tips tons of decision-support photos and information. Generally, you answer a few questions to describe your interests, and on-line you are presented with a possible itinerary including very specific names of facilities and dates and a price for your party. You can also contact them by phone or FAX for more intensive help in pinning down the details; but it does seem that if you want to go to one of the cities they cover they have done 95% of the hard work for you.
According to their literature "GeoPassage seeks to empower people to experience the world on their own terms, at their own pace, creating their own path. ... GeoPassage ... provid[es] a wealth of information on destination countries, cities and attractions, then allowing customers to create the itineraries that are right for them. ... After the customer creates their dream itinerary, they can book their tour online or by calling GeoPassage Travel Consultants at 877-MYTOUR2. GeoPassage takes care of all the details of the trip, including hotel reservations, domestic flight reservations, attraction and sightseeing fees, and a personal guide in each city. If customers have any questions about their tour, GeoPassage provides a team of knowledgeable and experienced Travel Consultants to answer their questions."
On March 1, 2000, GeoPassage.com and the United Nations Foundation announced that a portion of all proceeds from GeoPassage.com tour sales will go toward the worldwide humanitarian efforts of the United Nations Foundation, Inc. GeoPassage.com will make donations in the following areas, as directed by customers : Children's Health, Women and Population, Environmental Protection, Humanitarian Causes (Peace, security, and human rights), and General Support . The United Nations Foundation administers the distribution of the gigantic donation made by Ted Turner to United Nations agencies.
This development makes GeoPassage look like a corporation that wants to spend resources helping to support the human development in communities in which it operates -- a concept of great importance in a world where some multinational corporations are more powerful than many countries and are capable of promoting social conditions that override what local populations and governments might wish. Since they rely upon reasonably stable social conditions and institutions just to carry on the business of the market, the longer they take to show the concern the GeoPassage is showing, the greater is the risk that they will shoot themselves in the foot by killing the goose that laid the golden egg of today's successful markets.
As of mid-April 2000 we found no discussion of GeoPassage on the Usenet; but someone did post a story about the owner from the Austin American-Statesman. It says that "as a young girl, Arti Srivastava longed to take visitors deeper into her beloved India, digging beyond the predictable sights and cities to uncover the lesser-known cultural gems. ... 'As a child, I dreamed of being a cultural ambassador to the world,' Srivastava said. 'For me, the satisfaction comes from delivering a holistic cultural experience, and I realized I could harness the power of the Internet to deliver that.' " She previously owned, for four years, a travel company in Seattle. The story ends with the following quote by Arti: "Travel is about people, not just about destinations ... It's about helping people see the world on their own terms but still capturing each country's essence." That's one thing we've learned in this business -- you can talk about places and sights as much as you wish, people-to-people relations are the heart of successful tourism.
The one thing that seems odd about their literature is the promise of "the ultimate in safety, style and comfort." Perhaps there is no problem here while "ultimate" remains undefined; but too many people, we think, are going to see this remark as a promise on which they cannot deliver. Even the President of the USA cannot be assured safety in travelling around his own country, let alone little people travelling in exotic foreign places. And the problem with travel safety arises not only from bad luck that affects even the most careful and well protected traveller, it also arises from health and safety risks inherent in things people do for fun while travelling.
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