Two travel industry organisations join forces to raise professional excellence among culinary tour operators & tourist guides.

Today Group Tour Professionals “TourPros” and the World Food Travel Association (WFTA) announced the launch of a new partnership between their two travel industry organisations. Under the new partnership, each organisation will share resources to support small destination experience operators and food travel businesses around the globe.

Group Tour Professionals Co-Founder Adam Connolly said “We are delighted to partner with the World Food Travel Association and start working with Erik and his team. They are a passionate group who have expertise in food travel research and professional certification. We believe our closer relationship will help our members enhance their experiences to customers and we look forward to extending our support services to a new audience of Food Travel professionals. Our sister organization, the International Association of Tour Directors and Guides, will also benefit from additional learning opportunities, while WFTA operators can access IATDG’s vast resources of independent guides from around the world.

“When we met Adam and Von, the guys behind Group Tour Professionals, we knew it was a good fit,” said Erik Wolf, the WFTA’s Executive Director. “We share a common vision to guide the tour operator and tourist guide industry and raise the standard of excellence across the world. We look forward to our first joint project.”

The partnership will allow each organisation to share each organisation’s skills, knowledge, connections and training material accessible to the other organisation’s members.

Industry and media professionals can learn more by visiting the websites of the respective organisations.

ABOUT GROUP TOUR PROFESSIONALS (GTP)

Group Tour Professionals was founded in July 2020 to unite and support small, independent Destination Experience Operators (DEOs) from around the world. These include providers of local tours (such as food, cycle and city tours), venues, activities, and other experiences in a destination. Group Tour Professionals (GTP) already provides education, professional development and networking opportunities, resources and exposure for these operators. The association is free to join. For more information, visit www.TourPros.org.

ABOUT THE WORLD FOOD TRAVEL ASSOCIATION (WFTA)

The WFTA is a non-profit organization that was founded in 2001 by its current executive director Erik Wolf. It is recognized as the world’s leading authority on food tourism (a.k.a. culinary tourism and gastronomy tourism). The WFTA’s mission is to preserve and promote culinary cultures through hospitality and tourism. Every year, the organization serves nearly 200,000 professionals in 150+ countries. For more information, visit www.WorldFoodTravel.org.