Bite 5: How’s this Elephant going to get moving?
You’re getting towards the tail end of your plans now. You and your team have put in a lot of thought about your Where Tour, to What and Why… and now we need to chew over the last bite as this will help your partner finalise the plans and then you’re all go!
The HOW – there’s a few considerations on how this will work
Taking the decisions that you’ve made to date, you now you need to tick off some of the finer points of your plans. This will flesh out your plans and allow you to form an itinerary and quote that fits the bill.
When? What’s your timeline? – Do you need time to do extensive fundraising? Are you travelling in the school holidays (this isn’t ideal for an exchange tour when people are away)? What’s the weather going to be like for outdoor concerts? What will your payment timelines look like? Is it on or off season where you’re heading for your matches, so will there even be a team to play?? There really are oh so many things to think about!
How many are travelling? Will you be taking just your core choir or sports team, or do you have a long list of supporters wanting to join you? What’s your Duty of Care requirement for Adult Supervision?
How long do you want to make this meal last? How many performances and choral workshops will you want? How many training sessions and how many games? Just how long will be stay in each location to then offset your sightseeing that you will want to do? Can you actually afford to stay that long?
Which brings us to Budget … do you really need to go to Disney? Some activities and venues will profoundly affect your end cost, especially if you have a small group. Think carefully about what is important and what is just a nice to have. Oh, how interesting…this leads us back to the WHY…! What a circular elephant you’re eating, aren’t you glad you’ve got an expert on board?
The Super Niggly Questions: Will you be travelling with musicians who need to take their instruments along? Do you need an ambulance on hand at your game, just in case? Will there be a translator on hand to ensure we don’t do the wrong thing? My multicultural group is travelling on international passports…now what?!
Most importantly, how can you reduce your stress..? Your expert provider should be able to help with all these things. They should be able to remove all the challenges and make the process smooth from here on in.
Can you see why it’s important now to put so much effort into choosing someone who understands the group travel market up front? Like truly understands it? You’ve got your itinerary and your quote now, your tour is everything you ever wanted and it to be and that’s because when you take the elephant one bite at a time you can only ever come out with a great outcome. Now that hard part …. Wrangling the group members!!! Oh my goodness!
