Something is shifting in the travel industry, and I say that as someone who has been watching it from the inside for nearly 40 years.
The advisors filling their pipelines, the suppliers earning lasting loyalty, the wholesalers building relationships that survive disruption increasingly, they share a quality that doesn't show up on a rate sheet. They lead with purpose. And the market is responding.
I have lived this firsthand not just as the CEO of Your Premier Travel Service, the oldest African American-owned travel agency in Detroit, but as a philanthropist who has spent five years weaving giveback into the fabric of travel. From donating school supplies to an orphanage in Mexico with a group of women who gathered for sisterhood and came home changed, to partnering with the Jamaica Tourism Board post-COVID to deliver supplies to recovering communities, to mentoring women entrepreneurs across Africa.
I have seen travel used as a vehicle for transformation long before it became an industry talking point. Most recently, as a participant in ALG Vacations' Kindness Conference and Kindness Connection at Zemi Miches in the Dominican Republic, I sat in a room full of travel professionals who had gathered not to sell, but to serve.
That experience confirmed what I had been feeling for years: the industry is not just moving in this direction. It has arrived.
From Charity Add-On to Core Strategy
Gone are the days when "giving back" meant a once-a-year check to Habitat for Humanity or a beach cleanup sandwiched between conference sessions. Today, the most forward-thinking travel companies are embedding philanthropic partnerships into their supplier selection, itinerary design, client conversations, and brand identity. They are funding wildlife conservation in Kenya, supporting women-led cooperatives in Southeast Asia, preserving Indigenous cultural heritage in the Americas, and protecting marine ecosystems in the Caribbean. The scope has expanded dramatically and so has the business case.
This shift is not happening in a vacuum. At a moment when international foreign aid has been dramatically scaled back, communities that depend on tourism dollars are absorbing a serious blow. The private sector and the travel industry in particular is stepping into that gap. Organizations like Tourism Cares, Tourism for SDGs, and the Global Tourism Plastics Initiative have built robust infrastructure for impact tourism. Destination stewardship coalitions from Costa Rica to Rwanda are gaining momentum. The architecture of responsible travel has never been more developed or more urgently needed.
And here is the part that matters most to you as a business owner: travelers know. A 2024 Skift Research study found that more than two-thirds of global travelers consider a company's social and environmental commitments when choosing who to book with. Clients are switching agencies over supplier records. Wholesalers are fielding questions about community impact that didn't exist five years ago. Purpose has become a competitive differentiator and the professionals who understand that early are building something their competitors cannot easily replicate trust.
Women Who Move the World
In every corner of this industry, women are doing the work. Not as figureheads as architects. Building the infrastructure of impact from the inside out, leading foundations, redesigning destination stewardship, all while running businesses and mentoring the next generation. There is no better moment than International Women's Month to name them, honor their vision, and examine what purposeful leadership actually produces for this industry.
Jennifer Doncsecz, President of VIP Vacations didn’t set out to build a philanthropic model. She set out to sell travel exceptionally well. But in 2018, when VIP Vacations received a prestigious sales award from El Dorado Resorts in Mexico accompanied by a $20,000 prize something shifted. Standing at the ceremony, she made a decision that would quietly redefine her entire approach to the business: she donated the full amount to the Lomas Angel Fund, El Dorado Royale’s dedicated local charity, on the spot.
That instinct deepened the following year when she launched the inaugural Female Leaders in Travel Conclave in 2019. Planning the event, she found herself thinking not just about the attendees, but about the resort staff who would serve them and about what it means to ask people to bring their best energy to work when they are carrying the weight of unmet needs at home. She organized a supply drive, partnering with the resort and a local organization to let attendees give back directly to the community hosting them. It became the highlight of the event. It has been a fixture of every event since.
Today, the Travel A.L.L.I.E.S. Society, the community Jennifer leads integrates a giveback opportunity into each of its three to four annual leadership events. Attendees consistently name those moments as the highlight of their experience. And the ripple effect has extended well beyond her own organization: resort partners and major travel suppliers have begun building similar philanthropic components into their own events, modeling a standard that Jennifer helped establish.
“Once you realize that you can’t truly serve your clients without first honoring the people who make those experiences possible, doing good stops being an extra task and starts being the very heart of your business," Doncsecz said.
Her advice to professionals just beginning this journey is characteristically practical: start where you are. Ask your resort partners what they actually need. Find a gently used suitcase. Fill it with school supplies. Be intentional. The point, she says, is not the size of the gesture, it is the decision to see the destination as more than a backdrop for your client’s vacation.
I have had the privilege of witnessing Jennifer’s work firsthand. What she has built is not a program or a policy, it is how she leads, and how she measures success. This is the kind of professional this column exists to spotlight someone who figured out, doing good and doing business were never really two different things.
This column exists to shine a light on the professionals proving it every day. Each article will spotlight the advisors, vendors, wholesalers, and destinations putting this belief into practice, and examine what those choices produce downstream: deeper client trust, stronger supplier alliances, a brand story that no advertising budget can manufacture. We will follow the money and the mission together because in the travel industry of today, they are increasingly one and the same.
We are just getting started. And there has never been a better time.
If you or someone you know should be featured contact [email protected].
“When travel professionals gather around purpose and compassion, they don’t lose their competitive edge. They sharpen it.”
— Sanya Weston, Owner of Your Premier Travel Group
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