A Mom And Pop Tour Business Blueprint
On the Road Again
Jim and Cindy Leach have it figured out. They have found a way to live life to the fullest, constantly traveling to fun destinations, meeting new friends, and experiencing the best their state has to offer. The great thing is that they are paid to do it.
During the next year, Jim and Cindy will tour the governor’s mansion, gamble in the casino riverboats, shop in the Kansas City Plaza, listen to a performance of Handel’s Messiah, experience a NASCAR race from the grandstand, and attend the state’s largest rodeo. In addition, they will not be alone. Jim and Cindy’s Tours schedules these and other fun-filled trips for any variety of adventurous souls. Read more…
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Adventure Gifts For Those Who Have Everything
You could create adventure gift packages, arranging travel and accommodations and coordinating guides and any needed equipment, so that the gift giver would only need to contact you and purchase the package. You would be the intermediary, arranging things with vendors and sorting out the details to bring these adventure gifts to those who want to buy them. You will be a booking agent and should charge around 10 percent of the total cost of your adventure package. All you will need are a computer, a phone, and good people skills.
Are you dreading giving another sweater, scarf, or designer tie to your loved one this year? Your loved one may have every purchasable product they could possibly need or want. However, do they have adventure? Do they have excitement? If you could give them a gift that would make their eyes light up and their pulse race, that would let them escape from a life of boredom and routine and experience the adrenaline rush of a lifetime, wouldn’t you do so in an instant? Well you are not the only one! There is a growing market of people looking to give more than the average box gift wrapped with ribbon and topped off with a bow and gift card. These people want to give the gift of adventure and excitement. This is where you come in!
Choose wild destinations and trips that include such things as drag racing lessons, skydiving, jet skiing, white water rafting, hiking the Himalayan Mountains, etc. Remember, your goal should be to arrange a trip that will challenge and excite. These will be trips of a lifetime; exposing them to new and exciting experiences, they cannot see or do under normal circumstances. Perhaps they have always dreamed of running with the bulls in Spain! Maybe they are more the type that would like a safari, and get up close and personal with the wild animals, in Africa. Lions and tigers and bears, oh-my! Maybe they would like to live with the Eskimos in Alaska or follow a polar bear migration! Perhaps they want to travel the path of the Donner party! Maybe they would like to be involved in saving an endangered species of animals in a far away jungle! Maybe they would like to take a trek thru Peru on a llama’s back! Perhaps they would like to harvest wine grapes in Italy and stomp them in large vats with the locals! On the other hand, maybe helicopter over a volcano and then hike to the edges of its lava flow is more their style? Can they imagine themselves, or their loved ones, being taught to be a stunt driver or leap from tall buildings (while being filmed, of course!)?
The scope of these excursions is only limited by your imagination. If it can be imagined, in today’s modern age, it can be arranged. Since you will be coordinating the travel, accommodations, and lessons or on-site activities, it will be a hassle-free, unique, and exciting trip for the recipient!
Contact your local tourist office for some ideas and destination pricing structures. Make travel magazines and books your best friends. You will want to offer a range of travel packages, including some more moderately priced and then some that would only be possible to the most affluent of travelers. Most people looking for the adventure of a lifetime are not going to be concerned with the price tag involved. Be sure to market to those who have money to spare. Your marketing goals should be to get your business in front of people who are searching for that perfect gift for the person who has it all. Ask yourself and determine where these people can be found?
In addition to networking with those in the travel industry, you may want to advertise your travel packages by running a visible ad in local newspapers and phone directories. Don’t forget to list your business with any applicable online business directories and also print up flyers and post them in places where professionals and nonprofessional people in your area would more likely frequent. Be sure to take advantage of any public bulletin boards in your immediate area to find the people who are looking for you and your services.
In no time at all, you will have built up a large client base, many by word of mouth after experiencing the once-in-a-lifetime trips you have planned for them! They will likely want to give a similar gift themselves!
Resources:
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The Beach Bum Profit Plan
When people visit any type of beach, there is a huge danger they are facing – the sun. What if the beach goers forget to pack their sunscreen, or sun block, with them? Create a business where you go to the beach and carry a backpack full of sun block and sunscreen that you can sell to others. Offer a spray-on type, so you can spray the sun protection right on people, this way you don’t have to touch them. You could charge $5 per application or sell them their own to apply.
If you live near a beach area that is frequented by people, what a great service to offer people right on the beach. Even if they have brought their own sunscreen, they may prefer someone else spraying them quickly with a protective sunscreen instead of trying to cover every spot themselves.
Depending on where you live, this could be a great part-time or even full-time job. Of course, you will always have more people wanting your services during the summer time months, just because the heat tends to draw more people to water then. Nevertheless, surprisingly many people frequent beach areas year round. There are often trails that people walk regularly near beach areas and many enjoy fun things to do outside even when it is cold.
You could offer several different types of sunscreens. For those that would rather apply and purchase their own from you, carry small tubes that you can sell to them. Carry several spray-on types that you can offer to spray your customers with too, just in case they would prefer your helpful service. Make sure that they know how long the sunscreen they choose will work for them. This is a perfect way to provide your services and you don’t even have to touch them to do it.
All you will need to do to start this fun ‘business idea’ is invest in a backpack and a few different types of spray-on sunscreen and sun block, don’t forget to have a good variety of small tubes to sell also. It is probably a good idea to offer a sunscreen that will stay on in the water also, for those that plan to swim. You might want to invest in some sort of advertising to attach to your backpack too. Print an explanation of your services plus how much you charge per application on it, for people to read as you walk by.
You could charge about $5 per spray application. This seems like a reasonable amount to ask for. If you encounter a large family, you might offer a discount for a group service. It seems like it is easier to forget something important like sunscreen when you are packing up a whole family for a day at the beach.
You will need to have reliable transportation to the beaches and you will want to visit on a regular basis. Once people are used to seeing you there on the beach, they will start expecting you, so try to make your visits regularly and at about the same time each day, preferably before they are sunburned.
Resources:
www.sba.gov/smallbusinessplanner/index.html
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Selling Stories From The Grave
Offer cemetery tours, tell the stories of those who have passed and are buried in that particular cemetery. You can take up to 10 people and charge $100 per hour. The tour would usually take about 2 hours. Any longer and it could get boring or tiresome for the group. You will need to research the stories, memorize them, tell the stories well, and be great with people. You will probably want to get permission from the cemetery’s local administrator first. Market to tourists!
You might be surprised to know how many people visit cemeteries when visiting different areas. Cemeteries are very interesting to some people; a group of people exist that like to collect rubbings from certain head stones as mementos or just visit to learn something about the local area they are visiting. These are the people, which would love taking a tour of a cemetery with you, to learn more about the people buried there.
If you live in, or are close to, an area that has a significant cemetery this could be an extremely profitable ‘business idea’ to pursue. You can take up to 10 people and charge $100 per hour. The ultimate tour should usually take about 2-hours, but you could also offer 1-hour tours to those that are not able to stand, or walk, a 2-hour tour. Any longer and it could get boring or physically tiresome for the group.
If you have a particularly interesting cemetery to offer tours in, you have an option to offer different types of tours also. Each tour could have different themes such as; famous people, well-known politicians, famous mobsters, war veterans, etc. As you can see depending on where you live and the access you have to cemeteries, these tour themes can vary in what you may decide to offer. You will probably have returns for more tours if your tours are interesting and you offer more tour themes.
You will need to research the stories, memorize them, and be comfortable with people. Maintaining pleasant speaking skills will help you deliver enjoyable and interesting tours. If you are not sure if you possess the skills needed, many books exist on the subject and speaking classes are usually offered in most community education classes. This skill can determine how successful you are in giving your tours.
You will probably want, or need, to get permission from the cemetery’s local administrator first. This can be a very important aspect of your business to research, before you put too much work into providing a tour. Find out any rules that the cemetery may want you to follow in showing proper respect for the dead also. Include this at the beginning of each of your tours, so you will not irritate the cemetery caretakers.
Of course, you will want to market your service to tourists! Make your touring service available through your local travel agencies. Leaving well-designed printed information about your tours at all of the local hotels and motels in your area is a beneficial idea too. In leaving printed information, you may want to offer it in areas a little further away also. Most tourists are willing to drive a couple of hours for an interesting tour. Don’t forget the people that live in your area, they may well be interested in touring their own cemeteries and find out who are buried there. Advertise in your local area newspapers and magazines. The investments you make in advertising should be well worth what you will receive in giving tours.
Resources:
www.tourmobile.com/tours_arlington.php
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