We’re often asked whether we can design and deliver dedicated tours. This page explains what’s possible.
Availability
We do four tours per year.
The number is limited because we offer our tours in the seasons where the weather conditions are best in the places we visit (not too cold, not too hot, and not too rainy). We therefore tend to stick to late March to early May and September/October. In these months we have to plan around public holidays in China (e.g. Tombsweeping Day, Labour Day, Mid-Autumn Festival and National Day).
All our tours are led by Ed Sander, and we don’t normally run tours back-to-back because each tour needs proper final preparation. Therefore, there is always at least one week between the tours.
Together, these factors result in two tours in the Spring season and two tours in the Autumn.
Timing
Developing a study tour takes time, especially when the program needs to be adjusted (because of client wishes or new trends). We do frequent location scouting based on new interesting trends and build relationships with companies that might want to host our groups before visiting.
As a result, we can’t deliver tours on short notice. We generally start planning the next tours half a year in advance and don’t plan more than a year ahead either.
If we still have one time slot left, we can normally organise something for the relevant season up to three months ahead, but by then all time slots have usually been booked.
Group size
Our regular tours are designed for 10-20 people, including the tour leader (Ed Sander). Above 20 people, certain logistical aspects become very difficult, and we also believe that the group cohesion and networking effects are much better in smaller groups.
We sometimes get requests to organise tours for smaller groups of management teams or board members. We can organise tours for smaller groups, but the price per person will be significantly higher since the fixed costs are divided over fewer people.
We do not do tours for more than 20 people, but we are happy to discuss options for splitting larger groups into separate tours.
Program
We have a standard tour program that is constantly updated with the latest developments and trends. The tour is focused on learning about the retail activities of China’s internet companies and includes the following themes:
- Digital Ecosystems
- e-Commerce
- Live Commerce
- Instant Retail
- C2M (customer-to-manufacturer)
- Cross-border e-commerce
During the tour, we have morning masterclasses in which Ed Sander explains these themes in depth. In the afternoon, we visit companies and retail locations related to the morning’s topics. This way we combine theory and ‘real life’ to give participants the best learning experience.
On top of this business program, we add some cultural elements to give the participants a better idea of Chinese culture, which is essential to the business program. Examples include visits to the Forbidden City (to get a feel for China’s history), city parks (to see how Chinese people spend their leisure time), a typical ‘Chinese night out’, and different Chinese cuisines every day to experience the country’s culinary richness.
Tailored programs
We strongly believe in our tour approach, and based on participant feedback (ratings of 9-9.5 out of 10), we don’t want to change a winning formula.
Sometimes potential clients ask us to tailor the tour. We can do that up to a certain level. For instance, we can remove some topics from the aforementioned program that are less relevant to the client and group. We can replace these with guest speakers and visits to companies where the client already has a relationship. However, if this would change more than one third of the program, we normally decline the request.
We normally do not facilitate tours and itineraries that a client has completely planned out.
Participant Regions
We primarily focus on clients and participants from Europe.
While our tours can accommodate a number of vegetarian and vegan participants in a larger group, we are not properly set up to handle groups from countries that have other strict religious diets (e.g., Hindu and muslim travellers) because our meals are all based on Chinese cuisine.
What we do not do
- We do not organise tours for individuals (but sometimes, individuals can join a tour of another client).
- We do not organise tours during the winter or summer periods.
- We do not organise tours on short notice. We need at least 3 months to prepare, and a time slot still has to be available.
- We do not organise ‘hard tech’ tours that focus on topics like robotics, dark factories, AI, Electric Vehicles (EVs), etc. Our tours may touch on some of these topics where they are relevant to retail and e-commerce, but they are not the main themes.
- We do not organise tours for over 20 participants.
- We do not organise tours based on a full itinerary provided by a client that is not based on our regular tour.
- We do not arrange company visits for clients who have not previously been part of our tours or who do not already have an invitation to visit.
- We cannot guarantee that we can visit all the companies that we have visited on previous tours. Companies hosting our tours highly depend on the profiles of the delegates in our groups.
If, after reading the information above, you are still interested in working with us, feel free to contact us.
