When it launched in 2019, Départ Travel Services attracted a few seasonal guests through direct bookings and local partnerships. That changed a few months later with its GetYourGuide partnership. Now its immersive Sahara and cultural tours in Tunisia welcome tens of thousands of travelers year-round.
Aymen Omrani, the founder of Départ Travel Services, expected a gradual uptick in bookings after joining GetYourGuide, but the demand far outpaced expectations. That rapid growth meant expanding the company’s fleet and team faster than planned while still prioritizing service quality.
“Our mission is to help travelers discover Tunisia in an authentic, human, and unforgettable way,” Aymen says. “We don’t just sell tours. We create meaningful connections between visitors and local culture. Our goal is that every guest arrives as a customer and leaves as a friend, having experienced Tunisia through the eyes of locals.”
Here, Aymen explains how Départ Travel Services turned seasonal demand into year-round international growth, and how GetYourGuide data now helps the team adjust departures, plan capacity, and maintain service quality as the business grows.
What makes your guides so central to the experience?
They are at the core of our differentiation. The guide is often the real “product.” Their storytelling, energy, and knowledge shape the entire experience.
Vehicles and routes provide comfort and access, but it’s the human connection and storytelling that make the experience memorable.
How do customer reviews help you improve your tours?
We invest heavily in training, internal standards, and feedback loops. Every guide is continuously evaluated through customer reviews, and we use that feedback to coach and improve performance.
Reviews also influence the experiences themselves. We continuously adjust itineraries, pacing, and inclusions based on feedback. For example, we improve comfort stops, adjust timing for heat conditions, and refine storytelling based on what travelers enjoy most.
What inspired you to partner with GetYourGuide?
It was partly faith and partly perfect timing. In fact, I believe we were one of the first Tunisian travel agencies to partner with GetYourGuide.
A friend of mine, who runs a kitesurfing club called Kite Aventure, introduced me to GetYourGuide. From the very beginning, I appreciated the support, follow-up, and practical advice we received. The team helped us understand how to improve our products and visibility. Those insights played an important role in our growth.
What started as a simple introduction became a long-term partnership that helped us reach travelers from all over the world.
What surprised you most about the growth you saw through GetYourGuide?
The biggest surprise was how quickly we were able to scale internationally. We expected gradual growth, but the platform accelerated demand far beyond our expectations, forcing us to expand our fleet and team much faster than planned.
The biggest challenge, particularly after COVID, was managing that rapid growth while maintaining service quality. GetYourGuide helped by providing consistent demand, a structured booking flow, and visibility into performance, which allowed us to plan staffing and fleet expansion more confidently.
How do GetYourGuide customers differ from your direct customers?
GetYourGuide customers are often more international, more review-driven, and more comparison-oriented. They tend to carefully read reviews before booking and are more likely to be first-time visitors to Tunisia. Our direct customers are often repeat or referral-based.
We also see two quite different booking patterns among international travelers. Some book very early for long trips, while others book at the last minute once they arrive in the country. There is also a strong reliance on reviews and photos, and a preference for fully organized, hassle-free experiences.
How do you use GetYourGuide data to improve your business?
We use it to monitor booking trends, track conversion rates, identify best-selling time slots, and adjust staffing and fleet allocation. It also helps us understand which experiences perform best and where we need to improve visibility or pricing.
For example, we used performance data and booking trends to identify high-demand periods and underutilized time slots. By adding additional departures during peak demand windows, we increased occupancy and improved revenue efficiency significantly, by an estimated 20–30% on key products.
How do you manage demand when tours sell out, or bookings come in at the last minute?
We actively monitor availability and reallocate resources in real time. If a tour sells out, we try to add extra departures, guides, or vehicles where possible. For slower-selling products, we adjust pricing, improve visibility, or bundle them with more popular experiences to balance demand.
We also keep flexible capacity in our fleet and maintain standby guides during peak seasons. This allows us to absorb last-minute demand while still giving pre-booked guests a well-organized experience. If we have no other solution, we propose a different date or a full refund.
What makes a tour profitable beyond bookings?
Profitability goes beyond volume. It’s about efficiency and sustainability. A tour is profitable when logistics, such as routes, fuel, and vehicle occupancy, are optimized, guides are well-utilized, and customer satisfaction leads to strong reviews and repeat demand.
High-rated tours also reduce marketing effort because they naturally convert better.
How do digitization and AI play a role in your operations?
Sales and operations benefit the most from digitization. It allows us to manage bookings in real time, optimize availability, track performance, and respond quickly to customer demand. It also reduces manual coordination and helps the team focus more on service quality.
Our integration with GetYourGuide helps us synchronize availability, manage last-minute bookings, and reduce operational errors. It keeps our operational team and drivers aligned with real-time updates, which is especially important during peak seasons when demand changes quickly.
We use AI mainly to support translation, communication with international clients, and content optimization for listings. It also helps us analyze reviews more efficiently and identify recurring customer feedback patterns that we can act on quickly.
What's the weirdest or most memorable question a guest has ever asked you?
One of the funniest moments was from a guest who had booked a three-day Sahara tour. She asked if she would actually be sleeping directly on the sand and if there would be snakes around the camp. When she finally arrived and saw the desert camp and her tent, her reaction was simply, “Wow!”
It reminded us that many travelers imagine a desert camp as sleeping on the ground in the middle of nowhere, without any facilities. In reality, they are often surprised to find comfortable accommodation, proper beds, showers, and a much more enjoyable experience than they expected.
What does success look like in two to three years?
Success over the next two to three years means building a strong, dedicated team, establishing reliable long-term partnerships, and continuing to deliver authentic, high-quality experiences.
Most importantly, we want to stay true to our mission of showcasing a different side of Tunisia through the eyes of a local. We want to offer travelers a more genuine, immersive, and personal perspective of the country.
As we grow, maintaining the quality of our service and the personalized attention that define our brand will remain our top priority.
Key Takeaways
- Put your guides at the heart of the experience. Départ Travel Services treats guides as the real “product,” using training and customer reviews to strengthen storytelling, service, and the tours themselves.
- Use international reach to turn seasonal bookings into year-round demand. Since partnering with GetYourGuide in 2019, Départ Travel Services has grown from a small number of seasonal guests to tens of thousands of travelers per year.
- Use booking data to add capacity where demand is strongest. By identifying high-demand periods and underused time slots, Départ Travel Services added departures and increased revenue efficiency by an estimated 20–30% on key products.
- Keep capacity flexible as bookings grow. Extra departures, standby guides, flexible fleet capacity, and real-time availability help the team respond to sold-out tours and last-minute bookings.
- Use technology to keep growth manageable. GetYourGuide integration helps Départ Travel Services synchronize availability and reduce operational errors, while AI supports translation, listing content, and customer review analysis.
.png)
