BikeToursDirect represents 75 local bike tour operators around the world, with 300+ bike tours in more than 60 countries. Through the company’s website, BikeToursDirect.com, clients can easily find, choose, book, and pay for high-quality, locally-run bike tours in popular destinations like France, Germany, Italy and Holland, as well as far flung locales like Cambodia, Panama, Vietnam, and Nepal. Partnering with local operators allows BikeToursDirect to offer a large and diverse selection of affordable bike tour to match a variety of interests, ability levels, and budgets. The company’s website offers extensive planning tools and tour information, and the company’s tour specialists help clients throughout the planning and booking process.

1. Media Kit 2012

2. One-Stop Resource for Bike Tours Worldwide.
BikeToursDirect represents 75 local bike tour operators around the world, with 300+ bike
tours in more than 60 countries. Through the company’s website, BikeToursDirect.com,
clients can easily find, choose, book, and pay for high-quality, locally-run bike tours in
popular destinations like France, Germany, Italy and Holland, as well as far flung locales
like Cambodia, Panama, Vietnam, and Nepal. Partnering with local operators allows
BikeToursDirect to offer a large and diverse selection of affordable bike tour to match a
variety of interests, ability levels, and budgets. The company’s website offers extensive
planning tools and tour information, and the company’s tour specialists help clients
throughout the planning and booking process.

3. The BikeToursDirect Difference
Until recently, travelers had few options for overseas bike tours.
They could book generally upscale and expensive tours with
North American companies. They could research their own
routes, book lodging and tote their own gear. Or they could try
to track down local bike tour companies, which tend to offer
lower prices. But time and language differences and making
foreign payments often made the last option a challenge.
Enter BikeToursDirect, “the one-stop resource for bike tours
worldwide.” Rather than offer its own tours, it currently
represents more than 75 local overseas bike tour companies
with more than 300 tours in 60 countries across five continents.
BikeToursDirect handles the entire process – booking,
confirmation, payments, and tour documents – and helps
clients with tour selection.

4. BikeToursDirect.com
BikeToursDirect consolidates the local operators’ tours
into a single website: www.biketoursdirect.com.
Search tools help travelers sort through the tours to
find those that match their preferences, including
countries, dates, level of difficulty, duration, cost, daily
mileage, and interests. Each tour page features
extensive information on daily programs, pricing,
included services, terrain, hotels, highlights, and other
helpful details.
Clients book through the website, and the company
takes it from there, handling the complete booking and
payment process. The site also features extensive
information to help clients choose their destinations
and tours and to plan their trips.

5. Why Tour with Local Operators?
Expertise: Local companies know their areas better than
anyone else. They know the “secret” insider locations, routes,
and restaurants and are eager to share with their guests.
Low Cost: Thanks in part to low overhead, local companies’
tours often cost 50 to 70 percent less than those offered by
their American counterparts, while still offering high quality.
Variety: Local tour companies offer a depth of variety in their
regions that can’t be rivaled by international companies.
Frequent Departures: Many tours are offered on a weekly, or
even daily, basis.
International Camaraderie: When booking a guided tour,
clients are likely to be touring with international travelers rather
than just Americans.
Supporting Local Economies: Most client funds stay in the
local economy at their destinations.

6. Great Value for Consumers
Thanks to the lower tour prices charged by local
overseas tour companies, a full 10% of the tours on
BikeToursDirect.com cost less than $700/week, and
nearly half of the 300+ tours cost less than
$1,000/week. Clients can generally book tours at the
same prices they’d pay booking directly with the local
tour companies
Many clients are turning to self-guided tours, a familiar
concept in Europe that is growing in popularity
worldwide and among American cyclists. Self-guided
doesn’t mean self-contained. Packages include lodging,
breakfasts, luggage transfers, detailed maps and route
information, a service hotline, and other services. They
often cost 20-30 percent less than guided tours, which
add a support van, ride-along guide and dinners.

7. Extensive Variety and Depth
Until this year, BikeToursDirect focused exclusively on Europe, with perennial cycling
favorites like Tuscany, the Loire Valley, Holland and Austria’s Danube Bike Path and
emerging cycling regions such as Croatia, Bulgaria and Poland. In 2012, the company
is expanding to four more continents with less-traveled destinations such as Tibet,
Laos, Peru, Argentina, and Namibia.
Local bike tour companies offer great variety in their home markets, with multiple tour
choices concentrated in specific regions, where the companies have local expertise.
Add to this the number of tour companies BikeToursDirect represents in many regions,
and some areas have a dozen or more tours to choose from. For example,
BikeToursDirect features 15 tours in Provence, 10 in the Loire Valley, 14 in Tuscany
and Umbria and more than 60 in Germany alone. Most tours cater to recreational
cyclists, although some target more adventurous riders. BikeToursDirect can often
work with its tour operator partners to customize itineraries to suit specific needs or
interests.

8. European Bike Tours
BikeToursDirect spent its first eight years in
business exclusively selling bike tours in
Europe, and today its highest concentration of
tours is still in Europe. From the storybook
landscapes of Austria to the rolling
countryside of Provence and amazing cuisine
of Tuscany, Europe is unmatched in culture,
scenery, and bike-friendliness.
Some perennial favorites among their
European tour destinations include Austria’s
Danube River Bike Path and Salzburg Lakes
region, Croatia’s Dalmatian Coast, the French
wine country of Provence, and the Italian
countryside of Tuscany.

9. Global Expansion in 2012
New for the 2012 cycling season, BikeToursDirect
is expanding its offerings beyond Europe to
include over 325 bike tours in more than 60
countries across Europe, Asia, Africa, South
Pacific and the Americas. This expansion has
given BikeToursDirect.com one of the most
comprehensive collections of worldwide bike
tours, allowing travelers to easily find and book
the bike tour of their dreams..
Highlights from these newly expanded
destinations include tours such as “Tibet: Road to
Everest”, “South Africa Cycle Safari”, “Israel
Classic Adventure”, “Jordan: From Dead Sea to
Red Sea”, “Vietnam from Hanoi to Ho Chi Minh
City”, and “Bali Paradise Ride”.

10. How BikeToursDirect Got Started
The idea for BikeToursDirect came from president and founder Jim Johnson, an avid
cyclist and former corporate America nine-to-fiver whose bike brokerage epiphany
came from his own experiences abroad.
In the early 90s, Jim was a part-time travel writer who realized that bicycling is the best
way to explore and experience a country. He made direct contact with European bike
tour operators to help organize his tours. In the late 90s, Jim told some friends about
his travels, and they asked if they could come along. Over time, more friends—and
friends of friends—joined the group.
So in 2003, he left corporate America and launched BikeToursDirect—representing the
local companies he’d been working with for years. During that first year, the company
sent about 150 clients overseas. This year, the company is on track to send more than
2,000 clients on their dream vacations.

11. BikeToursDirect in the News “Shunning the high-priced,
escorted, group bicycle
“
tours for non-escorted, do-
"The easiest way for American cyclists to it-yourself biking along a
book an overseas cycling tour may be prescribed route has
”
through BikeToursDirect” become a major, budget-
priced vacation activity,
and no service handles
-Melissa Adams, Suite101.com this better than
BikeToursDirect.”
“A Five-Star bargain by my reckoning”
- David Lamb, Chicago Tribune - Arthur Frommer’s
Budget Travel
“Do as the locals (in Amsterdam) do – hop on a bike. It’s one of the
best ways to see the city. (For tours,) check out a company called
BikeToursDirect.” - Peter Greenberg

12. Media Contacts
Steve Szczecina
Account Manager
Adventure Media
steve@adventuremedianews.com
970.568.7423
Natalie Roberson
Director of Marketing
BikeToursDirect
natalie@biketoursdirect.com
423-756-8907