Right guys, I’ve been thinking recently about organising a ride to northern France around the Normandy Beaches etc… and that started me thinking: would it be a viable business idea?I’ll explain in a bit more detail:
The tour would be guided over 4 or 5 days, everything would be organised for you, i.e. chunnel/ferry crossings, accomodation depending on the level of luxury wanted (camping, hotel, bed and breakfast).
The history side of it could be altered to suit the group, so it could be 2 or 3 of the days riding to and visiting the different historical locations, beaches, batteries, museums etc…, or possibly more if that’s what people want, then the remaining day(s) would be spent riding/enjoying the local area.
In this example the history side is WWII stuff but could be WWI or even earlier.
Evenings would be free time to relax in the hotel/campsite/local bars and bistro with suggested locations for evening meals. So that’s the basic idea as it stands, would love to hear your opinions, ideas and or any advicethanks guys
Sounds like a great idea. We did an English trip a few years ago back in school to Belgium. It was fantastic and the highlight was having a British ex-soldier talk about his combat experience and stories from his tours, whilst in one of the WWI graveyards - granted it wasn’t a WWI soldier or story but it was relevant and even had the teachers in tears - definitely made the trip the memorable experience that it was. Maybe get someone similar on board? I also remember from that trip being in Calais and seeing 2 BMW GS’s waiting to board the shuttle at 6am and couldn’t help but wish i was one of them, actually one of the reasons I got into bikes! Anyway we had a great day and the history was the reason so combining that with bikes a super idea, however my vote was ‘depends on cost’! Let me know when the first trip is planned!
look in the back of most bike mags and you will see those kind of tours also lots of places doing accommodation as well, still probably a good idea and would say go for it as plenty of places to visit ie Normandy Beaches, Mont St Michel, then theres the Somme region for WW1 tours done a lot of them myself but always more to see
I know a lot of people who do this type of thing, and in all honesty some are struggling because of a) the competition, b) the bike touring market is quite depressed at the moment, c) people are more confident in arranging their own trips these days.
If you have something unique that stands out from the crowd, then you have a good chance of success, but it may be worth organising a few ad hoc type trips, see what response you get, and then develop it if there is the demand.
I wouldn’t have thought you’d get much business doing this, Northern France is easily reachable and I think most people would rather plan it themselves than pay someone else to do it. Also, the weather isn’t that different to the UK, I think people will look at the area as more of a stopover point on the way to/from further destinations than as a standalone tour.
And as someone already said, there are alot of others doing these trips, though I haven’t seen any for N. France, which might suggest that there isn’t a decent market for it.
i’m probably not looking at doing as a main source of income, as i know the market may not huge, but i was thinking along the lines of maybe one trip a month, maybe 2 a month over the summer months
A lot of people a scared to go over on there own so I think you could be onto a winner as loads would like to go over…look how many put there names down for the odd day trip over there.
Me and a mate done dunkirk and normandy then to paris via lille for museums and sights last year on bikes was really good but would be up for doing it again especialy if routes planned abit better then we did as winged it most of way but did find some awesome roads and little villages to stop in
It sounds like good fun. I would like to do this trip, I have dived the WWII wrecks so seeing the landscape would be good. You will need a history geek though.
