Adventure Collection

A conversation with Jim Sano, president of Geographic Expeditions.

DG: How did Geographic Expeditions get started, and how did you get involved with the company? 

JS: I need to tell a couple of interweaving stories to answer this question. The first involves the start of Geographic Expeditions, which was founded as InnerAsia Expeditions. That beginning goes back to 1981 and a legendary trek to the North Face of Everest by the first American group ever allowed into the Tibetan backcountry. That trek was organized by the great photographer and mountaineer  Galen Rowell  and his extraordinary high-energy associate Jo Sanders. Among the participants on that path-breaking adventure was Tom Cole (whose own brilliant account of the founding of Geo Ex can be read on geoex.com).  

The seed of InnerAsia was planted on that trip, in a tent at about 16,500 feet, when Jo’s friends urged her to start an adventure travel company.  Jo had a singular passion for the mountains and an uncanny ability to match the Chinese Mountaineering Association bureaucrats drink for drink and toast for toast, and through an elaborate dance of banquets and protocols, she was able to land permits to remote and unexplored parts of Tibet and Western China, which became the foundation for the first InnerAsia trips.  

After a couple of years, Jo sold InnerAsia to Al Read, a pioneer in the adventure travel world and an old friend of Jo and Galen’s who had been operating trips into China and Tibet from a base in Nepal, and George Doubleday, who brought extensive travel industry experience from years at Pan Am, some much-needed financial backing and a vision of what adventure travel could be. George and Al began to patiently build the company into what it is today.   

The second story begins in 1978, when I was working for the National Park Service in Yosemite. That year, on a lark, I applied to get one of the coveted permits to climb Mt. Everest. At that time there was a ten-year waiting list to get a permit to climb the mountain, and the Nepal Mountaineering Association process was much more restricted and exclusive than it is today: They were allowing only two expeditions a year on the mountain, one in the spring and one in the fall. As luck would have it, a Polish team canceled in 1978, and shortly thereafter I received this unusual looking letter from the Nepal Mountaineering Association at the Tuolumne Meadows Post Office saying, “Would you like this permit?”  So a bunch of us rangers chipped in for the down payment, which I think was $1,500 at the time. 

I traveled to Nepal in 1979 and ’80 to begin to make the arrangements for all the Sherpas and liaison services and support we would need to move five tons of gear from the Kathmandu airport all the way up to Everest base camp.  And lo and behold, the person I ended up working with in Kathmandu was Al Read. A few years later, our expedition – the 1983 American Mt. Everest Expedition -- went up, and met our three objectives:  One was to come back with all our fingers and toes; the second was to start out the expedition as friends and come back as friends, which doesn’t always happen on these mountaineering expeditions; and the third was to make an earnest attempt at the summit, which we did.  

After that I stayed in touch with Al, and the following year he and George Doubleday asked me to lead a trekking climb with Pritemba Sherpa, who was one of the most famous Sherpas at that time, of a peak in the Annapurna region that didn’t have a whole lot of technical difficulty and was a little over 20,000 feet.  I agreed to do that and took a holiday from the Park Service, and that was the first InnerAsia trip I ever led. We got our people to the top and down safely, and then I led another trip in ‘86, and another in early ‘88. By this time I had left the Park Service and settled in the Bay Area, and later that year Al asked me if I’d like to come over to InnerAsia full time, and I did. 

So you joined in 1988. How has the company evolved in the two decades you’ve been here? 

Well, when I first arrived, I think there were eight employees in our San Francisco office. 

Really! And now there’s…. 

Nearly fifty employees. And the focus then was primarily on the Himalayan region and South Asia.  However, shortly after my arrival, Tiananmen Square happened, and that profoundly influenced the landscape of travel to Asia in general.  Coincidentally, Yvon Chouinard, who was a longtime friend of Al, was encouraging us to take a look at this remote 60,000-acre ranch in Patagonia that had been used by the British explorer, Eric Shipton, as his base station while he’d explored the Patagonian ice cap.  Yvon said, “This place is situated in a national park and it’s really magical. Just go there and take a look at it!” So Al went down there, and then I went down there, and we both fell in love with the place.   

And therein embarked our path to expand beyond the boundaries of the Himalaya and South Asia into other parts of the world.  Nobody had ever heard of this place, Estancia Christina, and what we were doing at the time was finding ourselves: Our niche was slowly evolving into exploring places that had never been offered to Western travelers before, and that became our mission, whether it was in Patagonia or the far reaches of Western China, or the Soviet Union, which was also opening up at that time. And so the focus of the company became to push the boundaries and look at destinations that were not on the radar screen for most travelers, to look for opportunities to go into really unique destinations that had never been offered before.   

Overlaying all of this was the fact that the market was changing, that airfares to the far reaches of the world were becoming more and more affordable to the average traveler, and that the universe of people who wanted to do this kind of travel in a more organized way was expanding greatly.  That fed right into what we were offering, and what our value proposition was. 

This was the late ‘80s, early ‘90s? 

Right. Then a seismic series of events occurred -- including the Lockerbie incident, the first Gulf War, and attacks on tourists in Egypt -- which caused us to think that maybe we should diversify even more, not only in terms of geography, but also in terms of business types. So we started doing the same type of logistical work for the film and media industries and also for corporations such as Boeing – places that needed logistical travel support but not for leisure travel reasons. And at the same time we were working more with alumni associations, museums and non-profit organization.  So that was another period of diversification and during this time the company really matured.  Then right along came the dot-com boom and the stock market boom and there was a lot of money and a lot of people interested in taking our kind of travel, and that fit into the growth of the company.   

But in the late ‘90s, we began to get a little bit uneasy about the boom. So we embarked on a strategic planning process where we identified different scenarios that might be in our future.  One was continued good times geopolitically and economically; at the other end of the spectrum was great instability geopolitically, and not so great financial times. We looked at how we might position our company under each of four different scenarios.  And so when 9/11 occurred, we already had a road map for how we could react to such a situation, cataclysmic as it was.  And we just basically put that plan into action, and it served us extremely well, in terms of making conscious decisions about our staffing, our marketing, and about ultimately positioning ourselves, knowing -- having looked back on various seismic incidents in the travel industry in the past -- how long it’s taken for American travelers to come back.   

Then in a short time span many things happened: 9/11, SARS, both Gulf Wars wars, and financial downturns. They all combined into what many of us in the industry called the “perfect storm,” and a lot of travel companies and agencies went out of business. Through that time we maintained our investments in staff and marketing, and ultimately, I think, positioned ourselves to come out the other end of the storm stronger. 

Since that time, of course, the world and the travel industry have continued to evolve, and it really causes one to think: What does a company like ourselves bring to the value equation for the travelers?  

You know, when I first started at InnerAsia, the primary means for communication with our overseas partners was the Telex. 

Now that’s a word I haven’t heard in a while. 

Right. When you think about arranging a trip now to Bhutan or to Africa – well, in 1988, it was very, very difficult for the average individual to do that on their own because they wouldn’t even begin to know who to work with.  Indeed, the way that we’d communicate was by this, you know, this very shorthand version of communication, the Telex machine. And it might take days or weeks for the person to respond. 

Then the fax machine came along, and that made it somewhat more accessible for the average traveler.  And then telecommunication costs dropped and, of course, the Internet arrived, and now it’s very transparent, a la Tom Friedman’s thesis, the world is flatter.   

Right.  In that flat world, what do you think Geo Ex or companies like Geo Ex bring to the value proposition now? 

Well, for certain destinations like Hong Kong or London or what I call “front country” destinations, I think very little actually, because you could hop on the Net and probably do a perfectly fine job researching your own trip and arrive at a pretty good solution for yourself or your family.  But it’s those destinations that are on the periphery, where there’s a greater chance for things to go wrong, either logistically or security-wise, or health-wise, where we can add value.   

The other dimension, of course, is time.  Researching on the Internet, as anyone knows these days, is a lot of work, to sift through who’s going to be the best fit for you, not only price-wise, but in terms of all these other dimensions. The analogy that I’ve often used is it’s like retaining any professional services provider, whether it’s an architect or a lawyer or a CPA. Most of our travelers could probably figure it out on their own, but they may not want to invest the time and energy it takes to research what the best solution is.  A good example might be doing your tax return.  Most people probably have the intelligence to wade through the latest tax codes or TurboTax to do it on their own, but they may not want to invest the time or energy to do so. They’re willing to pay the CPA 400 bucks an hour to do that for them, and to have some confidence at the end of the process that their return is properly prepared. Now, when those preparations involve security, or health, or logistics, and you only have a finite amount of time to take your precious holiday, then you might really want to pay somebody who lives and breathes this stuff to do that for you.   

We also find that oftentimes people are not fully aware of what they should know to make a good decision.  So part of our process, part of our marketing, is really to educate them as to what are all the things that people should be thinking about when they’re planning a trip.  A good case in point is the Galapagos.  There are 80 vessels that one can choose from to go to the Galapagos.  Most people don’t appreciate that fact.  And when one is contemplating a trip to the Galapagos, one isn’t always thinking about all the dimensions in terms of crafting a trip that really fits one’s needs and interests.  On the one hand, you can get a boat that carries 100 passengers, and on the other end of the scale you can have boats that hold 8 passengers. Some people might easily jump to the conclusion that an 8-passenger vessel is the best solution for them.  But what they may not be thinking about is, for example, if someone in the party is more susceptible to motion sickness, a smaller vessel may not be their best option.  Or if you have a multigenerational trip, you want to make sure that there’s enough diversity of shore landing activities  to fit the broad spectrum of a grandparent versus a teenager.  Similarly, in terms of group dynamics, and meal choices, one vessel might provide a better solution than others.  Or kayaking or diving:  Some boats offer kayaking, some boats provide wet suits, and some boats don’t.   

So one of our goals is to be a counselor, to really suss out what the needs of the individual travelers are and find the best fit, if we can find a fit. Half a dozen times we’ve said, “Hmm, given what you’re telling us, we don’t think we’re the right company for you.”     

At the beginning of our conversation you mentioned that the early mission of InnerAsia was taking Western travelers places that hadn’t really been explored by Western travelers before.  What would you say is the mission of Geo Ex now? 

Well, this has evolved over the years, but I can tell you that this is how we state our mission now: Geographic Expeditions provides exceptional journeys to unique destinations with an unvarying dedication to personal service, safety, and fun.  

How do you see the evolution and growth of the company from this point forward? 

Well, we’ve always maintained that we’re offering a service versus selling a product. And that, in my mind, is a big distinction in terms of how we position our company versus other travel companies. At many companies you hear the term “product” a lot, you hear “inventory control” a lot, you hear that kind of nomenclature, whereas the focus of our company is really more on delivering a service for customers who are willing to pay for that service.  The evolution is more along the lines of providing more customized, handcrafted trips for travelers who are willing to pay a premium for this service. So the future of the business is largely built around teams of individuals who are geographical specialists versus the traditional tour operator that has one team that does sales all day, others that do customer service and operations, that are divided into these areas of responsibility.   

Within each Geo Ex regional team, each member does all these roles? 

Right. They have the ability to orchestrate a traveler’s experience from a to z, and to oversee the trip from the beginning to the end. 

Which is a great boon for the customer, I would think. 

Yes. It’s like if you’re designing a house, and you’re working with a partner in the architecture firm from the time that you start thinking about building the house to the time that the house is completed. 

That does seem quite different from the way most other companies work –when did you implement that?  Or has that always been a part of the Geo Ex way?  

That’s always been the case. We’ve always been different in that respect, and it’s one attribute that sets us apart from our friendly competitors in that over half of our business is custom trips. 

Can you talk about the sustainable travel challenges of being a travel company now and how Geo Ex is responding to those? 

Well, I think really from day one we’ve had a commitment to behave responsibly, not only out in the field, but also in the office.  And we’ve really formalized that link from the time I started, in the late ‘80s, before the term “ecotourism” was even hatched. In essence, what we were doing was co-opting many of the minimum impact standards that our National Park Services uses in our  parks, and trying  share that knowledge with  our partners out in the field.  Our sustainability program is very multifaceted, ranging from how we market, to the type of building and the office we run, to how we behave out in the field and work with our partners. 

Is there any particular area that you’re proud of or that you feel is especially innovative in what you do? 

Well, I think one of the first initiatives we launched was to bring the backcountry wilderness standards of our national park system over to the Himalaya.  We led the field in Nepal, and ultimately Bhutan  in terms of operating those treks with the minimum amount of footprint – impact -- as possible.  So if I had to look back on one area where I felt we really made a significant difference, that would be it.   

Because your standards became the standard. 

Yes. Also, we have really helped, at certain junctures, bigger institutions in shaping their policies.  We were invited early on by the governments of Vietnam, Mongolia, Laos, and Bhutan, to be an advisor on sustainable development and the tourism sector of sustainable development policies.  We were invited by Ambassador Richard Holbrook to be an advisor to the government of East Timor when it first started to think about best tourism planning practices.  And we were invited by the World Bank to advise their organization on sustainable travel/lending practices.  We had the opportunity to train their project and loan staff as to what are the ingredients that translate into a good lending program.

Such small-scale programs are probably exponentially more effective than multi-million dollar programs. 

Yes, and far less prone to corruption.  So that’s been fulfilling. And recently, we’ve been involved in coming up with new approaches to looking at climate change and how we can best lessen our carbon footprint.  That’s a work in progress right now that’s very stimulating and exciting. 

All of this lifts what you’re doing out of the purely travel experience and puts it on a more global, shaping-the-future-of-the-planet level.  That must be pretty satisfying. 

Well, it is.  It is both satisfying and daunting at the same time because, unbeknownst to a lot of people, the travel industry is actually the largest industry in the world, according to the World Trade Organization.  And so when you look at the cumulative economic activity of all of the different types of companies in this sector of business, there is a tremendous opportunity to create meaningful economic opportunities for local communities that are far less consumptive of natural resources than some of the other alternatives.   

What creates the juice of the job for you every day?  What’s the excitement or the reward? 

A big part of the reward is – well, we’re not so big a company that I don’t have the opportunity to see every customer evaluation. See this stack of papers?  There are, I don’t know, 4,000 of these things that come across my desk, and so I do know that – we periodically assess from all the evaluations that we receive how satisfying an experience we have provided.  We’ve been doing this rather religiously, especially the last three years, and it’s very heartwarming that on a scale of 1 to 100, our average score amongst all our different countries and all the different customers who take our trips, is 95 percent.  Hopefully, this is indicative that our travelers are having enriching, fulfilling experiences.  It also is heartwarming that 72 percent of our business comes from repeat travelers and travelers who have been referred by people who have taken our trips.   

The other component which is really fulfilling is that we make it a point to introduce our travelers to non-profit organizations that are doing good work in destinations that we go to.  This runs the gamut from conservation organizations to health care and education, and for the most part are grassroots organizations that are really giving back wonderfully to the areas that we visit.  And our travelers, after returning from their trips, have opened up their wallets.  I know two schools -- one in Laos and one in Kenya -- that were built directly as a result of Geo Ex travelers, and other health care projects and conservation projects where people have literally donated millions of dollars to the conservation and restoration of a natural or cultural resource program.  We could never have done this individually as a company, but to see that  we provided the traveler the inspiration to make such a generous gift is really a great thing.