Éclat Travel's Blog

Posts Tagged ‘responsible travel’

When you plan a vacation you take a lot of time to figure out where to go, what to do and how much it will cost. Have you ever considered how socially, environmentally, or economically responsible your airline, hotel, caterer, transportation company or tour operator is? Do you care?

In the travel industry, I’ve come across more and more hoteliers, tour operators and other suppliers who consider these responsibilities to be critical to their success and actively pursue initiatives that raise their profiles as businesses who care and who have programs in place to prove it.  Those are the companies I personally prefer to do business with.  And, as a traveler, I would hope you do too.

Rebecca Fong of the Sacramento CVB recently wrote a blog about catering companies in her city who support and actively promote programs – or are the programs serving economically and socially disadvantaged people and groups in Sacramento. She sites TBL (Triple Bottom Line) as a tool for determining or selecting businesses that a visitor (leisure or business) will choose based on values of the company.

TBL is a way individuals or businesses measure the impact of their decisions based on values about economic, social and ecological success. It’s also one way meeting planners & event professionals evaluate potential vendors & suppliers.

If you would like to find out more about who your responsible tourism partners could be go directly to their website and view their mission statement and sustainability policies, or check other online resources and articles, here are just three:

• There are a wealth of articles at Conde Nast’s concierge.com.
• Virgin Holidays Responsible Tourism Awards – 2010 Winners 
• EcoTravelling offers tips for choosing the right travel operators to do business with.
• If you are a hotelier one way you can get involved is through HotelSoap.org.

You can also call your travel agent and tell them you’re interested in sustainable or responsible travel. Thanks.

Here’s to your next responsible trip.

Cheers!

Cheryl