This article is intended to help you organise successful group travel; whether you are new to group travel organisation or are simply looking to improve on your experiences. It is aimed at a verity of people in mind.  You may be an allocated tour committee member, Social sectary, Club president; or you may be a manager having been asked to organise a corporate trip. You may also be a best man organising a stag do or simply organising a holiday for a large group of friends.

Where to Start

If you have not organised group travel in-kind donations for nonprofits before you are probably thinking where do I start? If you have organised group travel before and it did not go so smoothly you should be asking – where should I have started last time?

The first thing you need to decide is who will be responsible for what, make sure those roles are clearly defined, and that the individuals understand their responsibilities. The number of people who need to be involved in organising group travel will vary depending on your group and destination. For small and informal groups you may decide that you will take responsibility for all the tasks. For large and more formal groups it is often best to assign tasks to multiple people.

You should consider:

–           Who will be responsible for collecting money?

–           For sports or performing arts groups – who will organise kit and clothing

–           Who will sell the tour to your group and convince them to go.

–           Who will organise your group – make sure they all have up-to-date passports, organise rooming lists, and carry out any other administration that needs to be done.

–           Fundraising

Idea brainstorming

Once you have decided on these responsibilities you need to come up with some general ideas of where your group should go and what they you should do. In some cases this will be easy as other factors will have already pre-determined this. If you are a sports group and are organising a trip for a sports tournament, your destination and main activity will have already been set. In this situation you should consider what other activities you may also want to do in order that you get the most enjoyment out of your trip.