Iran is one of the countries that is a suitable platform for attracting domestic and foreign tourists. But inappropriate platforms and wrong policies have caused that all the capacities of the country are not used as they should be
According to the Iran digital economy annotation, one of the obstacles to progress in this field that has been neglected is the limited networks of people who are active in this ecosystem. This causes problems to carry out quality tours and excursions in areas that are really worth tourism. Sometimes the information and tourism network of a region becomes strong and that city and natural place are welcomed by tourists, but at the same time, many other regions remain underdeveloped and the tourism industry in these regions is weakened.
Safar club is similar to a combination of “Divar” app and “LinkedIn” social network; In this way, people can find the services they want in the field of travel by searching it. The store section, which is a nature tourism equipment store, and the academy section, which provides tourism training. In the academy, we share content and videos that people should know and follow before traveling.
The creation of Safar club
Ghazaleh Hossein Qolizadeh stated: a comfortable, productive and efficient trip is a trip that is designed by a group and tribe, each of whom has experience in their own field; For this reason, we decided to create a tribe that can be called the tribe of people of travel. In fact, the travel network becomes a tribe under the travel club platform, and we have a mission to make travel and tour implementation simple and efficient according to today’s technology.
“Hamid Partooi”, the co-founder of Safar club, was active in different agencies and tours for some time and realized that all this information is exchanged by word of mouth and only because of the familiarity of different tour leaders. For this purpose, he launched a Telegram channel called “Safar moshaver” and realized the widespread need of this field to organize and systematize. This same Telegram channel, which is now a hangout for tour leaders, was the main spark for the creation of Safarclub.
The scale of the market
She said: the size of the market is measured in two main parts. The demand side, which includes travel enthusiasts and travelers, and the other side, which consists of tourism activists, stores, leaders, etc. Of course, sometimes tour leaders are on the demand side and use other services provided to run their own tour.
We have more than 3,000 tourism agencies in the country, more than 1,700 of which are active in Tehran. Also, we have 13,000 tourist guides with cards, and we guess that about a quarter of them are active in the market. In this market, there are more than 20,000 accommodations, 2,500 nature tourism and mountaineering stores, and 100 active tourism training institutes.
The statistics on the domestic tourist market
According to statistics, it is estimated that we have 20 million domestic travelers, and if each of them spends an average of 500,000 tomans per month, the market size will be 120,000 billion tomans. According to the 2021 survey, about 70% of accommodation bookings for travel are done online, but the share of online platforms in this market was only 9%. The assessment of 2019 shows that 74% of people tend to live in a rental accommodation instead of a hotel, which is a significant statistic.
Hossein Qolizadeh added: We have been based in an accelerator at the Science and Technology Park of Sharif University for six months and we have 1500 active users on the site. Validation and matching of the product with the market has been done and we are in the phase of attracting capital. We want to be in the category of travel tools so that if people plan to travel, they will definitely visit us.
Foreign Market
50% of tourist arrivals to Iran are from Arab countries, and this has drawn our attention to this market. We are exploring international markets with a focus on neighboring countries. Now some tour leaders and translators have profiles on our site and provide services.
The advantages for an investor
She explained: An investor is primarily looking for innovation and profitability of an idea; From this point of view, our idea is innovative, because it generally focuses on a specific part of the market that has not been touched before. In terms of profitability, we also tested the financial process in the primary product section, drew conclusions and ensured the return of investment. Now we can assure the investor that Safar Club is the right place to invest.
Another issue is the average experience of the team. Our team has good experience in this field and each of us has worked in our specialized department for several years. On the other hand, in addition to the things I said about the size of this market, I can point to the statistics of the Ministry of Health, which announced that Iran’s income from health tourism last year was 1 billion dollars, and this sector has the capacity to grow up to 5 billion dollars. This industry has a lot of room for growth in the domestic and foreign fields, and so far a very small part of this market has been touched.
Sanctions and filtering
Travel is directly related to people’s economic status. When the general economic situation of the society is not good, one of the first things that are removed from people’s consumption basket is travel, and this has a direct impact on our work.
Women’s activity in tourism
Safar club has provided conditions that many women who live in villages and small towns can introduce their products and services and this has made their business visible. On the other hand, the presence of a sense of security for women’s solo and group trips with a female tour leader, as well as the presence of opinions from those who have already experienced the trip, gives women a good feeling for traveling to new areas.
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