What should I check before buying a tour company?

A tour company sells an experience, but what a buyer actually takes over is a set of relationships: with booking channels, partners, suppliers, guides and past guests. The general steps in doing your own due diligence still apply. This page adds the checks that belong to a tour operator.

Where the bookings come from

Ask the seller to break bookings down by source: the company’s own website, online travel platforms, hotels, cruise lines, group organizers and walk-ups. Each source behaves differently. Some accounts are tied to the owner personally and some depend on one contact at a partner. Ask which relationships would continue under new ownership, and ask the partners themselves, with the seller’s permission, once you are far enough along.

Forward bookings and customer money

Guests may pay months before they travel. Ask how many tours are already booked, how much has been collected for them and where that money sits today. Ask your lawyer and accountant whether taking over the business means taking over the promise to run those tours, and how the money collected is dealt with at closing. The same goes for gift certificates and vouchers. Your lawyer and accountant should set this out in writing.

Suppliers, attractions and guides

Read every agreement with a transport company, attraction, restaurant or equipment supplier. Look for terms that end when the owner changes, and for anything that only works because of a personal friendship. Then look at the guides. If guests ask for particular people by name, or the owner leads the best tours, the business may not run the same without them. Find out whether the guides are staff or contractors, and whether they plan to stay.

Reviews and online presence

Read the reviews across every platform, including the ones that name the owner. Check who controls the listings, the website and the social media accounts, and whether each can be moved into the company’s name. Without control of the listings, a buyer may lose the place where customers find the business.