Travel Grind

In this episode I’m talking to Lisa Benshea who runs the members’ travel program at the Santa Barbara Museum of Art in California. It’s a relatively rare affinity travel program that doesn’t just offer great destinations, but makes sure there’s always a strong art or architecture component in the itinerary to satisfy its travelers’ interests. And they must be doing it right, because the program is about to celebrate its 50th anniversary.

And even though art–-and museums in particular-–are a common part of so many visits to major cities whether it’s part of a group tour or individually planned, relatively few travelers book a trip specifically to see the art, or make it the main reason for choosing a destination.

I talk to Lisa about this, about who those travelers are, and about what makes the art worth traveling for. We get into well-known great destinations for art, like Italy, but she also comes through with some surprising recommendations that most of us wouldn’t think of as an art destination, and at least one that’s probably not on your travel radar at all.

We also talk a little bit about affinity travel in general, discover a task that all tour managers need to be able to pull off if the situation arises, and she drops a very tasty hint for anyone with a Nespresso machine.

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Lisa Benshea is the Travel and Special Programs Manager at the Santa Barbara Museum of Art. SBMA’s Travel Program, which began in 1972, typically puts on around 18 international and domestic tours per year for museum members. Lisa was born and raised in Honolulu, where she worked as a T.A. at the art school of the Honolulu Art Museum and would volunteer at events put on by the museum, where her mom and grandmother had both worked. She attended Punahou School for 13 years and went abroad twice on school trips. She came to California to attend Occidental College, where she earned her B.A. in Art History and was given the opportunity to study in Italy for six months. During and after college, she worked at museums and as an event planner for an autism organization, before taking time off to volunteer in India. When she moved to Santa Barbara in 2007, she found her perfect job planning trips for SBMA members, a job that combines her love for people, travel, events, and art.

In this episode I’ll be talking about the sometimes mysterious, often misunderstood, but always essential role of the tour manager with Temu Nana, a guy who seems like he was born to travel the world, is one of the finer tour managers I’ve come across, and is just an all-around interesting person.

While the job may go by various names like Tour Director, Tour Leader, Expedition Leader, etc., the tour manager is truly of singular importance to the success of many many types of travel, especially when it involves groups of travelers.

This is a person who doesn’t just hand out name tags and do headcounts; It’s somebody who needs to draw on a wide range of skills to get the job done, be extremely detail-oriented, proactive as well as responsive, project confidence yet stay humble, and on top of everything else be comfortable speaking in front of large groups of people.

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Temu Nana hails from Ann Arbor, MI and has spent the last 13 years working primarily as a Tour Manager in luxury educational and photographic travel. As a product of a multicultural household (his mother is from Canada and his father from Pakistan), Temu has long been at ease moving between various cultures and customs. He’s visited over 90 countries, led tours in over 50, and in 2019 he led trips on all seven continents! With an organized, fluid, and friendly approach to running tours, he tries to cultivate an enjoyable and efficient experience for the travelers. While travel is a passion, his time in between trips is spent on other goals/hobbies; he's a licensed glider pilot, college football fan (Go Blue!) and deep-space astrophotographer.

In our inaugural episode, industry veteran Steve Ridgway reflects on surviving 50 YEARS in the travel business, and still going strong. 

We touch on how he fell into the job, what’s made him stick with it for this long, and why he doesn’t feel like it’s a big surprise that someone has stayed in travel for the long haul. 

Then, without trying to make him feel too old, we talk a little bit about what travel was like when he got started and how things have changed, about some of the technology (or lack thereof), and even get into some predictions for the future of the travel industry. 

Hopefully you can glean a few insights into the what, why, and how of it all during our short conversation, though I’ll tell you right up front that he saves what’s probably the key ingredient for the very end...