Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Laura Gravino. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Laura, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today We’d love for you to start by sharing your thoughts about the pros and cons of family businesses.

My husband, Ian Taylor and I have been lucky enough to work together, building our business Ian Taylor Trekking, over the past 16 years. It is a unique experience, getting to work alongside your partner, developing your passions into a business.
I think the biggest benefit of owning a small business, that is family run, is that both of us are full dedicated to the future and success of our company. Everything we do in our life and careers in some way related to the future of our company. It really is a gift to get to work with your partner, doing something you love, and helping others build life experiences that we have found have shaped our lives to what they are today.
Having a passion for the outdoors, having a passion for helping others reach their goals, having a passion to help our teams around the world grow and develop and build better lives for them and their communities, are all part of what makes our family business a success. We would not change this experience for the world!
Of course, working with your partner is not for everyone, but for Ian and I, it has been a wonderful experience that we look forward to continue for years to come!

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

Myself and my husband are the owners and operators of Ian Taylor Trekking. We run hiking and mountaineering trips around the world. Some of our favorite and busiest destinations are in the Himalayas of Nepal, Kilimanjaro in Tanzania, the Inca Trail in Peru, Volcano climbs in Ecuador, Aconcagua in Argentina and more.

When we started our business, we were living in Ireland, where Ian is from. We eventually moved to the States, where I am from, and settled in Eagle County, Colorado, high in the Rockies. We are a small office in Colorado of just Ian, myself and Erin, and we manage the office here. We spent the early years of our business building our offices in the regions we work in. We have focused on building the relationships with our local teams around the world, to make sure that we can offer a very unique, individualized, high quality experience on all of our adventures.

I think that these relationships we have built over the years are what makes our business very unique in the industry! We have staff that have worked with us for over 15 years, and have become more like family to us than employees. We work with the same people all the time, helping us to build up those communities that we work in and see people grow and develop themselves and their families into a more sustainable future. We love what we do and love sharing these amazing people and experiences with others and we hope that shows in every trip that we run!

We have also spent a lot of time focusing on giving back to the communities we work in. When my husband was climbing Mount Everest, in 2008, he raised the funds to build a school in Kitandwe, Uganda. The school now holds over 350 children and is still growing. We continue to support the school and sponsor children to attend the school. When the Earthquake hit in Nepal in 2015, we started building schools in the villages that our Sherpa team are from, and now have 4 schools in the Goli Village region of the Himalayas that we continue to support. We also help support an orphanage in Arusha, Tanzania, at the base of Mount Kilimanjaro to help house, feed, educate and care for the children living there. In Peru, most of our porters that work on the mountain with us come from a very remote village in the mountains. We asked them what would be most beneficial to them and they said they wanted a multi-use facility that would serve as a community center, church, and meeting point for all members of the community. So we are now working towards building funds to make this a reality for them all!

Getting to work with people from all around the world has been such a gift to my husband and myself and having the chance to give back to them in a small way, has become a cornerstone of our business too!

What’s been the best source of new clients for you?

I think that we have been very lucky in this regard and it is one of the things about our company we are most proud of!

A very large percentage of our clients return to complete more trips with us. Also, our word of mouth clientele – meaning people that come to us because they had a friend or family member who did a trip with us and recommend us to them – is through the roof!

I don’t think there is a better way to judge your business by if you have people that are not only willing to do a trip with you again, but also if they are willing to recommend you to someone they know or love.

Having built our business without very much money to put into it, we never had the capitol to be able to spend a lot of money on advertisement. We had to do the work ourselves to try and get the clients to start running trips and build from there. So to be able to say that over the years, we have seen the same people come back time and time again and recommend others to join us, it has shown us that the product we are offering is giving people a unique and life changing experience. Having this play such a large role in how we get clients has been a great honor for us both!

What do you think helped you build your reputation within your market?

I think that there are a few things that have really helped us build our reputation in the adventure travel space.

First of all, I think that our teams on the ground that we have spent years developing and growing to offer amazing adventures for our clients has been one of the greatest ways that we have built our reputation. They are the faces you are with on the adventure, putting your trust in, keeping you safe, providing you what you need to be successful, and making it an enjoyable experience. So the fact that we have the same people, working together as a family, on all of our trips, makes it a very unique and enjoyable experience to be around.

We have helped our staff build other businesses, buy land, go to school, pay bills, helped their families, and helped them grow in their own career as they wish. So seeing someone on say our Kilimanjaro trip, who started 10 years ago as a porter, then worked their way up or team and developed their skills and English, to now become a head guide, is something we are very proud of and something we think is shown in all of the trips we run.

Secondly, I think that one of the very big reasons we have been successful and built a strong reputation is because we really are a concierge service! Myself and my husband have been here from day 1, directly answering all the questions and concerns our travelers have! We are in the office 5 days a week (and lets be real, we are honestly working 7 days a week) to answer any questions people have! So people feel that they are always having the questions they have answered from people who have done these adventures time and time again! I have climbed Kilimanjaro 10 times, and my husband has climbed it 46 times, so who is better to answer questions on the trip than us!

Giving our clients direct access to us, we feel that we have really built our business based on the fact that we want our clients to have every opportunity to go on one of our trips with every bit of information they need to be successful. And by being here, to answer their questions directly, we are helping them feel more confident in their chosen adventure.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.iantaylortrekking.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/iantaylortrekking
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/pg/IanTaylorTrekking/reviews/
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/iantayloreverest
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/Everestclimber
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/user/IanTaylorTrekking
• Other: Our website, Youtube, Facebook and Instagram accounts are the best spots to find out more!