We’ve covered a host of travel related business ideas and Unlocked Guides – the newly launched series of the children’s travel guides – sit firmly in the ‘it must have been done before’ camp.

And it has, but not a lot and often not very well.

Unlocked Guides deliver a kids’-eye-view of cities like London and Edinburgh containing interesting facts, places to go and plenty of illustrations – all developed in conjunction with kids and parents through regular workshops.

“all over the world, parents are researching trips without getting input from their children. We like children, and we decided they deserved better, so we started to write our Unlocked Guides”

Started by a couple of ex-management consultant twenty-somethings, Factfinder, the company behind the guides, also produces kid-friendly travel guides and fact sheets for travel and tourism companies.

Every industry has its own underserved niche – where will you find yours?

For tourists and locals alike, finding your away around Ireland is not always the easiest thing to do. Maps are frequently out of date and GPS devices rarely include details of interesting sights and attractions.

Irish entrepreneur John Ward has tackled the problem head on with a new GPS service, that not only helps you find ‘local activities, attractions and accommodation’ in Donegal but also helps bring them to life.

Navigatour works with most sat nav devices and includes information about attractions, accommodation, places of interests and quirky sites across Donegal – and will appeal as much to locals as tourists.

Even more interesting is Racontour, an audio upgrade which also includes interesting local histories, anecdotes and tales, narrated by locals – “some hilarious, some bizarre but all very interesting”. The audio files are triggered as the driver passes key locations, making it a bit like having a tour guide in the car with you.

In order to get some authentic audio material we recorded a radio series called Rambling House where we got some great stories. Storytelling is a vital part of Irish culture so it was great to be involved in this aspect…

Culture works very well with technology – it may seem like an odd partnership but in getting across what is great and interesting about this island, we need to work with the technologies that are in people’s pockets.

The downloads will be sold via the navigatour.ie website as well as through local tourist offices and there’s an iPhone application currently in Beta. Of course the hard work is in building up the stories and while the company hopes to replicate the model across Ireland, this could be a great one to partner with in your own locale.

The idea of location-aware city guides, running off mobile devices, has been about for a bit. Usually the concept makes use of the GPS capability of smart phones, to feed the user rich media info about where they are. Augmented reality overlays frequently get a mention too. Have a look at companies like mTrip and Layar for more in these spaces.

As exciting as these concepts are, there are issues. First off, bigger cities will (obviously) get more attention, particularly where content is user-generated. Secondly, the tech is still in development. Finally, there’s a marketing issue – how will the average tourist checking out the streets of London, New York or Singapore know which app to check out.

A slightly less technical option might suggest something of a solution on these fronts.

City Insights, which has recently launched in London, uses bright yellow on-street signage to notify tourists (and locals) of places of interest. These signs point users to a mobile site (accessible from just about any internet-enabled phone) where they can access interesting stories about the landmark in question.

The company has rolled out its first project across 40 locations on the streets around Southwark in London, as part of the London Festival of Architecture.

Although not as technically innovative as other projects in the pipeline, this approach is relatively simple to implement, accessible and effectively overcomes the marketing problem. It could easily serve as a model for towns, cities and places of interest just about anywhere.

Site: www.city-insights.com

Pic: lollyknit

Tours By Locals connects travellers with local people who can show them around.

Potential tour guides are interviewed by Tours By Locals to check credentials (for the ‘traditional’ kind of history/cultural tour) or …

“If the guide is simply escorting travelers and offering practical local advice, such as ‘how to cook a local meal’ or ‘nightlife of a city’ they may be a passionate local person without any formal training in tour guiding. Guides offering this sort of tour must go through the ToursByLocals approval process of interview and reference checking.”

So a potential interesting sideline if you’ve got some local knowledge or an idea that you could replicate for your own local market.

Site: www.toursbylocals.com

After time in graduate school and the Peace Corps’ Master’s International program, avid surfer Dave Aabo was looking for a way to combine his passions with the idea of doing good.

A couple of years surfing in coastal villages in Peru brought the idea for WAVES for Development into focus:

“WAVES for Development (WAVES) was born out of a simple desire to connect surfing and sustainable development in the disadvantaged communities we surfed in Northern Peru.   More specifically, make surfing available to youth who would otherwise not experience its joys and at the same time, use surfing as an educational tool.  We wanted to help coastal community members find creative ways to directly benefit from surfing and surf tourism.”

Surf voluntourists can now sign-on to spend two weeks or more with WAVES in Lobitos, Peru – working with local youth on educational programs and developing their own individual service projects. And surfing.

Volunteers stay with local families and must raise a minimum $400 project contribution plus $250 towards costs for each week they stay – and are encouraged to do so through campaigns that help spread the word about WAVES.

Voluntourism offers adventure seekers the chance to enjoy a life changing experience while doing some good at the same time. And WAVES is a perfect example of this growing trend – with a little surfing thrown in for good measure.

How could your passions lend themselves to a similar idea?

Site: www.wavesfordevelopment.org
Site: changents.com/waves

Pic: Flickr CC

Zero Baggage won’t launch officially until November this year but it’s an interesting – if a little squishy – idea nonetheless.

I say ‘squishy’ because it looks a little like 2 or 3 good ideas rolled into one. That said, the one big idea is consistent – helping you travel and live lighter through what they call the “temporary use of circulating items”. i.e. Renting.

The Virtual Suitcase lets you borrow new and pre-loved items from local retailers at your destination. You can pick them out yourself on arrival or choose from the online marketplace and they’ll be waiting for you at your destination. In other words, a kind of fractional ownership for clothes and other goodies.

Which sounds like a nice idea, but there’s more …

If you’re frequently travelling to the same location, you can store your stuff in a ZB Locker (another neat idea). There’s also a community element and a service called Citywide Wardrobe (which sounds like a version of the Virtual Suitcase for longstays or locals to use themselves for light living).

The site also hopes to reward users with various perks from local businesses in exchange for ‘carbon credits’ earned for travelling light. (Similar to Recyclebank perhaps?)

There’s certainly a lot of interesting ideas going on so here I’m keen to see how the site develops ahead of its launch. And as the idea of location independent living gains ground, it’s potentially a precursor of other businesses serving this niche too.

Site: ZeroBaggage.com Via: PSFK

An incredibly simple idea, 3floz.com sells nothing but travel-sized, ‘carry on approved’ toiletries and cosmetics. Also good for samplers and ‘those who can’t commit’.

An ideal concept to adapt for a UK / EU market?

Site: www.3floz.com

Toronto-based Tour d’Afrique organise (often transcontinental) cycling tours for “both serious athletes … and recreational cyclists”.

Last year they launched a division called DreamTours, where site visitors suggest a new route to be voted on by others – the best suggestions are then packaged up and sold:

“cyclists design their own DreamTour and post it on our website. If a DreamTour garners enough interest and is deemed to be do-able by our staff, it becomes reality.”

The first DreamTours will run this year from St. Petersburg to Venice. 2011 will be an transcontinental Indian Adventure.

Crowd sourcing tours helps the company engage with customers, sparks new ideas and demonstrates their commercial viability – all before they go to the trouble of actually organising it.

What else could you get the crowd to come up with – for you to then go organise? Dream holidays, dream concerts or dream conferences perhaps?

Site: www.tourdafrique.com/dreamtours

[NB: While you're checking them out, make sure to have a look at the Tour d'Afrique Foundation which donates bikes to individuals and organizations in Africa and encourages participants in the tour to raise funds for their favourite charity.]