Ep. 329 — Building Tours Around A Single Unforgettable Experience
Mid-America Productions is the largest independent producer at Carnegie Hall, and for 43 years it has run tours built around one event: getting an amateur choir on that stage.
The #1 Tour OPERATOR PODCAST IN THE WORLD, with over 400,000 downloads.
Tourpreneur brings you the stories and insights about the tour & activity industry every week.
What people are saying
“As a tour business owner, this podcast is what I listen to with my morning coffee.”
“The best podcast today for tour operators… For anyone in the tour industry – walking tours, food tours, historical tours, cultural tours, bicycle tours, bus tours, etc – this is an essential listen.”
“A weekly source of news and inspiration for tour & activity professionals. I was new to the space when I launched my experiences company and have learnt so much through listening to this show.”
“My go-to podcast to keep learning. I have learned so much from Tourpreneur!”
“I really enjoyed the in-depth look at the hurdles and achievements of running a local business.”
“So many incredible topics and contributors! Definitely one for tour operators and those in the experiences business to make sure you have on your regular rotation.”
“This is a game changer for your tour business. Can’t get enough because every episode is so rich and full of wisdom and practical help. It’s been an essential part of growing my tour company.”
“I’ve been searching for a podcast like this for months!!! LOVED the Bulldog Tours episode and the Flying Bikes episode.”
“This is a game changer for your tour business. Can’t get enough because every episode is so rich and full of wisdom and practical help. It’s been an essential part of growing my tour company.”
“Very much enjoying and learning from Tourpreneur podcast. Each episode is a winner.”
“Almost from end to end it was packed with excellent value – great stories, and great business advice…”
“I have done some University level study in tourism but to be honest I have learned more about the tour business listening to real world operators on this podcast than at the Uni!!”
“Your original Tourpreneur podcasts got us motivated to make this dream a reality. Current TP podcasts are ensuring we’re successful at it!”
“Love this podcast!! Since I started my tour company, I have been looking for ways to grow and get inspiration from others and Tourpreneur does just that.”
Explore our episodes
Ep. 328 — Mitch and Pete on What Could Change Your Business This Fall
Mitch Bach and Pete Syme step away from guest interviews this week to talk through three in-person events Tourpreneur is running this fall: two retreats in Porto and Tourpreneur CONNECT in Louisville.
Ep. 327 — How Jeanette Built a Local Tour Business … Only For Locals
Jeanette Pierce runs City Institute, a Detroit tour and learning-journey company built entirely around a customer most operators ignore: the local. For twenty years, starting when Detroit was headed toward bankruptcy, she has sold custom, private tours to corporations, universities, and community groups instead of tickets to the public.
Ep. 326 — How ‘New Scientist’ Turned a Media Brand’s Readership Into a Multi-Day Tour Audience
Kevin Currie is Director of New Scientist Discovery Tours, the travel arm of the 70-year-old science media brand. In 2019, he joined to scale what three journalists had started as a side project, got 20 tours to 86% sold before their first departure, then lost everything to COVID. He’s been…
Ep. 325 — From Coco Chanel to D-Day Beaches: Building Pilgrimages Around Characters
Jean-Vladimir Deniau founded Elyrea, a French company that builds character-based immersive performances for the tourism market. A professional actor embodies a historical figure and walks a small group through that figure’s neighborhood telling the story of their life. This episode covers why Elyrea sells to the trade first, the capital-light…
Ep. 324 — An Anthropologist’s Operating System for Running Day Tours and Multi-Day Tours Without Diluting Either
Mary Collins runs two tour businesses that share almost nothing on the surface and almost everything underneath. Blue Fern Travel is a DC food tour company she founded in 2014, with a four-restaurant format, a one-for-one donation model, and roughly 50,000 meals routed to a local nonprofit. Far Horizons is…
Ep. 323 — I Know A Guy Tours: A Six-Figure NYC Tour Business Built Around One ‘Guy’
Adam Guy runs I Know A Guy NYC Tours, a one-person private tour business in New York City he started after quitting a 25-year marketing career during COVID. Last year he ran 252 tours at an 88 percent margin, exceeded his revenue goal by 11 percent, and is currently booked…
Ep. 322 — The VAWAA Story: Building a Niche Tour Business on Human-Centered Design
There is no itinerary. No promised outcome. And a 98 percent five-star review rate. Geetika Agrawal is the founder and CEO of Vacation With An Artist (VAWAA), a platform connecting travelers with master artists in 42 countries for multi-day, one-on-one apprenticeships. The business does not sell tours. It sells access…
Ep. 321 — How The Chef Tours Built a 70% Referral Rate by Never Running the Same Tour Twice
Karl Wilder started The Chef Tours with 300 euros, no advertising budget, and a radical premise: spend the majority of your ticket price on food and wine, not marketing, and let your guests do the talking. It worked: 70% of his bookings now come from referrals. Karl spends upwards of…
Ep. 319 — Storytelling as a Competitive Advantage in the Age of AI
When AI bots can generate endless facts and flawless narrative, what’s left for human tour guides? Mitch sits down with VoiceMap founder Iain Manley to explore the future of storytelling in travel, from his perspective as a journalist and developer of a self-guided audio tour app powered by human creators.…
