L'édition 2020 du congrès Adventure Elevate de l’Adventure Travel Trade Association (ATTA) a eu lieu les 15 et 16 septembre, en format virtuel pour la toute première fois. Plus de 400 délégués du monde entier, dont 25 médias et près de 60 acheteurs, se sont réunis en ligne pour partager des histoires d'espoir et discuter des moyens de travailler ensemble pour élaborer des solutions de voyage qui répondent aux besoins des voyageurs d'aujourd'hui et de demain.
Voici les résumés des conférences qui y ont été présentées, ainsi que des liens vers les présentations.
Opening Keynote: Thriving in a Future World
The global pandemic has shaken the tourism industry to its core. However, there are other massive underlying drivers reshaping our world, which will have even bigger systemic impacts. This keynote, with predictions of the future, explores macro trends and how they might impact outdoor travel destinations, businesses, and individuals.
Trendspotting: The COVID-19 Traveler
In the middle of this year, after most travelers had been in lockdown for three months or more, the ATTA surveyed adventure travel customers of North American tour operator members to understand their future sentiment toward travel. Around the same time, ATTA Member Much Better Adventures took it upon themselves to interview and survey their community of travelers in the U.K. In the first part of this revealing session, dive into the U.S. consumer research findings with ATTA Head Research Manager to learn about factors influencing travel through the fall, consumers’ general travel preferences, expectations from tour operators and guides, anticipated travel spending, and eco-conscious travel considerations. Then, hear from Founder & CEO of Much Better Adventures to examine a surprisingly positive picture of where U.K. travelers are heading, how soon they want to travel again, and how their approach and expectations around adventure travel will have fundamentally changed by the time they hit the road. Download the full reports in advance (linked above), and come prepared with your questions for a live Q&A with both presenters.
We Go: Creating Diverse and Inclusive Companies and Experiences
Admittedly, the roots of adventure travel lie in explorer travel, which has long been the territory of those that identify as white, male, heterosexual, athletic, and middle or upper class. And yet the explosion of global experiences that seek to serve a wider range of travelers provides new opportunities and challenges for everyone in the industry, from gear brands to operators and from destinations to storytellers. While adventure tourism is by nature a culturally diverse landscape, we have far to go to be truly equitable in our organizational, business, hiring, and marketing practices. How best can we change what we do every day to become more inclusive for stronger engagement, results, and experiences? In this session, we’ll look at ourselves to first understand what we believe and why, and we’ll workshop ways to develop as industry leaders with the skills to walk through the messy and hard conversations that help us partner across difference.
Tourism: Wielding the Double-Edged Sword
Adventure tourism has long been promoted as a potent regional economic development tool. However, while regions crave the economic infusion that new visitors bring, some are reeling from the impacts of too many visitors. This workshop dives deeper into the macro trends shared during David Beurle's opening keynote to explore sustainable and smart tourism initiatives, where regional communities are working to achieve a fine balance between industry impact and local benefit. With examples from around the world, explore creative solutions for resilience and recovery during uncertainty, collaboration on shared visions, and smart destination development.
Keynote Workshop: Listening for the Future)
As we acclimate and adjust to a distinctly changed world and business landscape, it is becoming more important than ever to listen, and listen well. It's critical we hear the needs of our customers, our families and our communities as we settle into this 'new normal'. In this participatory keynote workshop, Former Disney Innovation Catalysts, Sura Al-Naimi and Lee Kitchen will help you amp up your own listening skills in both your personal and professional life. They will showcase simple creative problem solving and human-centered design tools that will help us hear this new world around us by being better active, empathetic and generative listeners. The future is calling...will we be able to hear it?
Closing Keynote : Over the Adventure Gap
As the USA experiences the need for a variety of systemic changes, the ATTA community is invited to participate in the soul-searching challenge of social equity in outdoor recreation. Starting with a summary of the newest research report detailing diversity and inclusion practices within the adventure industry, writer and professor James Edward Mills provides the questions we must ask ourselves as leaders as we springboard into a more racially just travel future. Following the brief presentation, he will engage in a live audience Q&A session on the main stage.