Celebrating Trailblazers and Shaping the Future of Women in Travel
By Debra C. Asberry
Women have typically been the driving force behind the family vacation – choosing the destination that appeals to her clan and then making all the reservations. Therefore, it is no surprise that women would embrace the opportunity to fulfill their own travel desires independent of the family, where all that is required of her is to pick a tour and show up.
At Women Traveling Together® we see women’s interests run the gambit from luxury resort stays to iconic international destinations to national park visits to high adventure. Women want choices! They will seek out the tours and group trips that have interesting inclusions and avoid tours that assume women only want time to shop and to be served wine at every meal.
Women’s trips will continue to grow in popularity in the coming years. Their appeal lies in the freedom for a woman to be herself, not someone’s wife or mother. It’s also a place where female friendships can begin. The group leader or tour operator who can design itineraries that are inclusive, supportive and facilitate female friendships will benefit from the fastest growing segment in group travel.
Navigating the evolving landscape of group travel
After 27 years of serving solo women travelers, I credit our ability to navigate the evolving landscape of group travel to two things. First, we built our own client and tour management system to respond to our clients’ ever-changing wants and needs and to more efficiently share information between the office staff and the tour leaders out on tour. Our software has given Women Traveling Together® a significant competitive advantage to do more with fewer staff members and to provide a level of information sharing that could not be obtained otherwise. We built our own system because tourism management services did not exist 27 years ago, but today there are a number of content management systems for tourism available by subscription.
Secondly, we try to stay ahead of legal, legislative and regulatory changes that could impact group travel. Our membership in the National Tour Association has been instrumental in keeping us abreast of changes on the horizon. Equally important are the relationships we have built with other tour operators and suppliers. These have been invaluable to us in understanding how other companies are addressing the same problems and challenges we are facing.
Key leadership lessons
Three things come to mind immediately. Show your clients you value everyone equally by treating everyone the same – without prejudice or favoritism. When you see a problem solve the problem. Don’t carry known problems forward. They only get bigger with time. Finally, don’t be afraid to empower your staff – both in the office and out on tour – to make decisions. They may get it wrong occasionally, but most of the time they’ll get it right! As a leader it’s easy to fall into the trap of believing you alone have all the right answers. I’ve learned that we get better results when decision-making is shared.
BIO
Debra C. Asberry – Founder & President of Women Traveling Together, Inc.
Debra Asberry has spent the past 27 years immersed in the solo female travel market. A self-taught marketer and database applications programmer, Asberry used these skills and her business acumen to guide her company – Women Traveling Together® (WTT) – from an idea to the largest women-only accredited tour operator in North America. Women Traveling Together will operate 130+ multi-day tours in the US and internationally in 2025, exclusively serving women traveling without a companion (i.e. solo).
Her formal education includes a Bachelor of Science degree in Mathematics & Physics from Clemson University and a Master’s Degree in Business Administration from Loyola College.
As the 2022 Chair of the National Tour Association Board of Directors, Debra contributed substantively to the recovery of the association post-Covid. In 2024 her industry peers gave her the Women of Vision Award for her contributions to the National Tour Association and to the travel industry.
Outside of work Debra Asberry is regularly invited to speak about women-only travel, solo group travel and solo-friendly travel. She has been a competitive swimmer from childhood and still takes her swimming seriously.
