Travel2Give has been launched by Scottish Travel Company, The Travel Division, who are based in Ayrshire. Its aim is simple - to create substantial donation funding for Charities throughout the UK from the holiday bookings of their competitors.
A surprising aspect of the programme is a launch partnership struck with the ‘c-change trust’ whereby every Charity affiliate who books a holiday can allocate a percentage of the donation their holiday creates to the Trust.
Ken Robb, Managing Director of Travel2Give, explains how the programme works: “We create a donation from a holiday booking by taking low profits, and we have convinced 15 leading tour operators and cruiselines to add a donation of their own. A typical family holiday could raise over £40, and with some holidays the figure might be as high as £100 – so the funding possibilities are really substantial. We wanted to include a complementary carbon charity to reflect changing consumer attitudes. The words ‘carbon offset’ are gradually coming into the traveller’s mindset, so we looked for a carbon charity which could become a major beneficiary, using a substantial part of the funding Travel2Give can create to deliver tangible offsetting. We selected the c-change trust as they offered strategic thinking, education and awareness in addition to offsets.’
‘Travel2Give has been two years in the making’, continued Ken. ‘We started off developing online member networks with small to medium sized organisations and gradually came to realise that people were motivated to book on behalf of causes that they believed in. Gradually, we refined the system, and, towards the end of 2007, we came up with the concept of Travel2Give. Over the last six months, we have re-written our business model to become a low profit making organisation dedicated to Fundraising and things have spiralled from there. As a company whose future is inexorably linked with the carbon emissions our product creates, we realised that we have an important role to play in our own future. The c-change trust have a progressive approach to the problem – they share our aim of engaging with ordinary people in addition to tour operators and cruiselines, and modifying behaviours incrementally. For example, a particular target is the second or third holiday that so many people take. We aim to promote holidays in the UK and near- Europe Rail trips as viable options.
‘c-change trust’ Co-Founder Richard Whistance also believes that launch partnership in Travel2Give is a significant outlet for the carbon message the Trust aims to deliver.
‘Our involvement in Travel2Give provides us with a significant opportunity to fund our activities throughout the UK, providing tangible offsets for Holidaymakers whilst delivering our Education and Awareness Goals to a growing audience. The goals we have set are realistic and achievable. Travel2Give will provide substantial long term funding for a wide range of good causes in addition to the c-change trust. It’s a worthwhile project in its own right, all the more so with its green dimension.
It is really pleasing that so many Tour Operators and Cruiselines have chosen to support Travel2Give, summed up Ken Robb.’ Famous names like Travel2, Holidays4U, P&O Cruises, Cunard and Triton Holidays have all come on board with donation support at a tough time for the travel industry. We feel sure that their support will help garner support for Travel2Give from charity affiliates all over the UK. With Gift Aid, our donation will often be 5% of holiday value. We are not aware of any Charity Fundraising Programmes which can even begin to approach this percentage, and the relatively high value of the average family’s annual holiday spend makes the creation of a Travel2Give Network an attractive prospect for any Charity, large or small. Up to 20% of the funding created can be directed towards the c-change trust at the consumer’s discretion.’
‘Over the next three years, Travel2Give plan to create over £500,000 of new donation funding for Charities throughout the UK – and just think what could happen if we really took off!’
Interested charities and their affiliates can join the Travel2Give Network at www.travel2give.co.uk or simply call 01563 528300.
