Thrilling the Tourists: Starting a Tour Guide Business

Business Overview:

If you’d like to build a profitable business where you meet new people every day, learn how to become a tour guide and consider starting a tour guide business. The chances are good that you’re already highly familiar with major landmarks and attractions around the city or area in which you live. With this business idea you put that knowledge of local hot spots to use by taking visitors on guided tours. In exchange for a fee, you conduct guided tours to major landmarks while enhancing your clients’ experience by providing historical facts and other interesting information about the sites on your tour. For example, if you lived in New York City you might conduct a guided tour to the Statue of Liberty, Empire State Building and Central Park—while at the same time entertaining your clients, educating them on the history behind your landmarks, and giving other interesting facts along the way. Of course, with a tour guide business you’re certainly not restricted to conducting tours in urban areas alone. If you live in the country or if you’re more passionate about nature and the outdoors you could choose a “green” niche and provide guided eco-tours of major natural landmarks—while again providing interesting information, such as geological facts about the natural sites on your tour. One thing that makes setting up a tour guide business an attractive proposition is that it’s possible to do so relatively easily and inexpensively. Yet at the same time, depending on your start-up funds, the potential is there to make this business as big and as profitable as you want to make it. For example, if the tourist spots in your area are within walking distance of each other and most major hotels, you could get this business started really cheaply by giving walking tours. If you have more funds available you can purchase a bus and conduct larger, more extensive tours. Going even further than that you could hire staff to conduct tours for you, and potentially offer a variety of tours in multiple areas and cities across your country—or even globally. Consider partnering with travel agents who can refer business to you when their clients will be traveling to your city/cities. There’s a lot of potential for growth, expansion and great profitability with this business. Moreover, it’s easy and fun to learn how to become a tour guide, and it’s a business that will always contain surprises and excitement. There are no special qualifications required to start this business, and you can easily attain the historical and factual knowledge of your major local landmarks by conducting simple research either online or at a local library. Once you’re up and running, you’ll get to meet a great variety of interesting people from all over the world each and every day. For lovers of sightseeing, therefore, starting a tour guide business truly could be your ticket to an enjoyable and profitable businesses doing what you love.

A Day in the Life of a Tour Guide Business Owner:

You will start your day by reviewing your tour bookings. Depending on the size of tours your business offers, you may have several groups of people booked for smaller tours at various times throughout the day, or you may have one group of people booked for a bigger daylong tour. Having reviewed your bookings, you will then set out on your guided tours. You’ll either meet your clients at a specific location, or you’ll pick them up from their hotels and then take them on to the major landmarks and hot spots of your tour’s itinerary. As you do, you’ll entertain your clients and by providing them with interesting historical and factual information about each of the landmarks on your tour. You will then end your tour either by dropping your clients back at their hotels or by taking them back to the location where you initially met them. If you have hired people to conduct your tours for you, then a typical day will be different. In this case, the majority of your day would be spent focusing on growing your business by marketing it to attract more clients for your tours.

About Your Customers:

The majority of your clients will be tourists from abroad, or visitors from other parts of your country. You may also attract local customers who are interested in learning more about the major landmarks around them by coming on your tours.

What You Need to Start:

• A tour bus for conducting your tours (or you could provide tours on foot)
• Good knowledge of hot spots and landmarks for your tours, including historical facts and other interesting information (alternatively, you can hire tour guides to conduct your tours for you)
• Insurance
• Business license
• Marketing
• Financial tracking software

The Good:

• No special qualifications are required to start this business.
• It’s possible to start this business at a fairly low cost.
• You’ll get to meet interesting people from all over the world.
• The potential is there for you to increase your profits and expand this business nationally or even globally.
• If you love sightseeing, either in cities or in natural environments, you’ll be doing what you love every day.

The Bad:

• You’ll have to work hard to get your tour guide business established as tourism can be competitive.
• The majority of your profits will be made seasonally (usually in the summer), so you’ll have to account for periods of low profits during tourist off-seasons (usually in the winter).

Resources:

• World Federation of Tourist Guide Associations
• Bureau of Labor Statistics on Tour Guides and Escorts
• Wikipedia on Tour Guides

About The Author

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