About a year ago, Gap Adventures introduced its Wanderers in Residence program with the goal of building relationships with the Wanderers that inspired conversation around the world on the topic of travel.
Many companies have celebrity ambassadors and the Wanderers in Residence is Gap Adventures’ approach to creating these ambassadors. To the team at Gap Adventures, the Wanderers are not only their ambassadors, but also their inspiration. To fellow travel aficionados, the global travel personalities that are the Wanderers are an important source of inspiration, advice and expert knowledge.
Initially, Gap Adventures reached out to bloggers whom they followed online and felt fit the mold of what a Wanderer in Residence should be. Simply selecting bloggers with loads of Twitter followers and Facebook friends was not the company’s goal. Gap Adventures wanted people who were long term travelers and could hop on and off the Gap Adventures’ tours while navigating the globe. Currently, the Wanderers in Residence program is comprised of six travel bloggers: Gary Arndt, Matt Kepnes, JD Andrews, Jodi Ettenberg, Audrey Scott and Daniel Noll.
Today, Gap Adventures moves forward with Wanderers in Residence 2.0. Program updates include improvements based upon the feedback from each of the Wanderers. Last Wednesday, Gap Adventures launched the very stylish Wanderers in Residence blog. First impressions from fellow travelers, bloggers and people in the travel industry via Twitter and Facebook have been very positive.
Gap Adventures plans to add three additional Wanderers by the end of this year. They are always searching the blogosphere for any and all travelers they believe may benefit from the partnership. Who knows? If you are an active travel blogger, you just might receive an email someday asking if you are interested in being part of this innovative program.
Gap Adventures’ Social Media Manager, Andrew Hickey, told Travelllll.com:
For us it was all about looking for people who inspired us to travel – and for people that had left the day job behind to commit to full-time travel. Some of the Wanderers had also travelled with us before and we enjoyed working with them – in fact, Matt’s Costa Rica trip with Gap Adventures many years ago was as he states, what initially got him hooked on travel.
Gap Adventures does ask the Wanderers in Residence to sign a contract that more or less states what the company is asking of the Wanderers and what the Wanderers will get in return for being part of the program. The Wanderers in Residence are NOT paid Gap Adventures employees. While one might think that Wanderers would choose Gap Adventures as their preferred tour company while participating in the program, Gap Adventures explicitly states that Wanderers are not to travel with a competitor if Gap Adventures already operates a similar tour.
Who will the three additional travel bloggers be? Stay tuned to the brand spanking new Wanderers in Residence blog for updates.
Would you want to be one of their Wanderers in Residence?
This sounds like a dream job. Although they are not paid employees, they do receive a pretty amazing perk – free Gap Adventures tours! Who wouldn’t like to venture through Europe, Asia and Antarctica? Might start blogging just so I could be considered for this one day.
A great group, for sure! Though, it looks like the girls are a bit underrepresented!
I’ll be interested to see who their next picks will be — more already successful and influential travel bloggers, or perhaps some up-and-comers?
Thanks for picking up the Wanderers in Residence update Rich. It’s an exciting initiative and we look forward to see what our newest Wanderers get up to over the course of the next year.
Sounds like a great opportunity! We’ll definitely be following along on the journey.
I remember when they announced the first Wanderers in Residence program and being rabidly jealous. It seems like such a great way to get travel bloggers involved and to promote the company in a natural way.
Will be interested to see who they choose to work with this time around!
Congratulations to all the bloggers above. We’ve met everyone but Gary and they are all amazing and good friends. Looking forward to following their journeys around the world.
It sounds like a great opportunity for both Gap Adventures and the travel bloggers involved. I didn’t realize they had a new website. I’ll have to check that out!