The best Northern Italy tours in Verona, Lake Garda and Valpolicella? Those designed by local and reliable Italian travel specialists.
Today you’ll discover the success story of Itinera Bike & Travel with the words of the founder Simonetta: a bike enthusiast since she was a kid who founded a bike tour company which expanded its core business with the aim of showing her land to the world!
Hello Simonetta, thank you for sharing your story!
How it all began. As the founder of Itinera Bike & Travel, would you like to share your business story?
It all began 12 years ago. As part of the Managing Team of FIAB Federazione Italiana Ambiente e Bicicletta (Italian Federation for Environment and Bicycle). As a member, we designed the first cycling trips in Italy. I found it fascinating to organize and manage groups and I decided to kick off my own entrepreneurial project, Simonetta Bike Tours, at a time in which cycle tourism was still a niche! After years of hard work, our business grew, and we decided to go a step further.
Why offering only bike tours to our aficionados and repeaters? Why not providing a 360-degree experience in our land and open up to the world? Itinera Bike & Travel was born. We became B2B Italian travel specialists in the destinations of Verona, Lake Garda and Valpolicella. We decided to bundle every cultural and natural facet of our territory, sharing our local community and lending our home-field advantage to design guided and custom small group tours for foreign incoming travelers.
How do you combine your active bike soul with the new experiential needs?
We focus on our land and nature, that we value and know the most, adding the most amazing experiences ever. Biking doesn’t only mean testing oneself, but it’s a way to reach a special place, such as a farmhouse or a wine cellar. The bike becomes the means to reach an experience, through unpaved and off the beaten paths roads, to discover hidden gems and untapped locations.
So we keep our active and outdoor soul, but as Italian travel specialists we attach great importance to create truly authentic experiences. Discover, relish and experience, our motto to describe a small group tour with Itinera, by bike or not: the important thing is to plunge in a lifestyle, in traditions and get to know the people who live there and somehow leave a “beneficial footprint”.
Addressing foreign travelers, which are the most significant values you would like to convey through your tours?
We would like to show the love, the passion and commitment for our land, and strike the right balance of nature and people.
Our main goal and mission is to combine a warm, personal and familiar approach with accuracy, timing, flexibility and competence. Based on our belief, travelers are not merely customers but real people with whom we would like to establish a relationship through our experiences. We would like to show our partner that relying on local Italian travel specialist can really make a difference.
Can you give us an example?
We are specialized in private and small guided group tours in Valpolicella, Lake Garda and Verona that we can customize for each request in order to appeal to the customers’ minds.
For example, we know our wine growing areas such like the back of your hand: during our food and wine tours, we strike the right balance between bigger and more striking wine cellars housed in ancient and charming villas and smaller family-run wine cellars that mirror the cozy hospitality of our land. We want to give our travelers the most authentic and transparent glimpse, a mix of must-sees and unknown spots!
Itinera Bike & Travel and sustainability: you’re part of ActiveItaly, an environmentally-friendly tour operator network, can you tell us something more about it?
Yes, it means a lot to me. ActiveItaly is a tour operator network which strives for sustainability, outdoor and active travel. The value behind this group: sharing our skills and professionalism during unprecedented times, endorsing our manifesto which aims at promoting slow and soft mobility as a way to improve our health and our spirit. Networking is a fantastic way to speak up with the same voice and raise awareness on these values.
So, how do you see Itinera Bike & Travel in 5 years? According to you, what are the main challenges you will face in the future?
First of all, as Italian travel specialists, one of the main challenges will be expanding our partner network on the territory: we are always scouting and monitoring new businesses that can share our mission. At the same time, we need to consolidate our position as spokesmen of aspects such as environmental protection and sustainability. In 5 years, I would like to see an innovative travel agency who design trips that can be enriching and lead to a transformation for our travelers. Shape their free time peacefully, still with a beneficial, inclusive and caring purpose. I also care to pass on the management to my daughter, Elisa, to the new generation, paving the way to innovation that combines our expertise and history in a seamless way.
| Keep reading: Italy small group tours as real locals – in Verona, Lake Garda, Valpolicella – Meet Elisa |