Escape artists – Adventure Life of Missoula offers clients a bolder brand of travel

Even though born and raised in Havre, Brian Morgan knows what it is like to feel trapped by the urban environment. People want to get out of it, he says – which is exactly why he thinks his business, Adventure Life Journeys http://adventure-life.com/ , is taking off.

By Jared Ritz Western Montana InBusiness

http://www.mtinbusiness.com/current/bus17.html

“Why are we going through this incredible growth we are? (Because) people are tired of the urban environment,” said the 30-year-old University of Montana graduate and owner of Adventure Life, a nature-based tourism company. “People are surrounded by their office and concrete. They have an urban life, and people are looking to rediscover nature.”

Morgan started Adventure Life in the fall of 1998 after flying home from a seven-month stay in Peru and Ecuador, where he was working, learning Spanish and discovering more about Latino culture. After applying for some jobs when he got back on familiar soil, Morgan began looking into and setting up a trip he and some friends could take back to South America.

While waiting for the employment callbacks and researching the trip, he had the idea that maybe he could do this for a living. After looking into it a little deeper, Morgan was struck with the thought “wow, this is a big industry. Nobody’s doing this. I can do this. I can be in Missoula and still have connections to South America.”

Although the original trip didn’t pan out, neither did the jobs he’d applied for. Instead, he started a company that helps the more adventurous traveler escape their concrete jungle and spend some time in a real one.

Adventure Life doesn’t offer trips to exotic lands that end up being watered-down or second-hand, Morgan said. To prevent this, the company uses local guides who have known the area since birth and are part of the local culture. Customers also have the option of staying in some locals’ homes. Basically, Adventure Life tries to give people a real taste for what living in these areas is like, he said.

“We try to show you something you would only see as a backpacker there for months,” he said. “I wanted to show people the Peru and Ecuador that I knew. That was the goal.”

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Adventure Life Journeys

Toll-free: 800-344-6118

Outside US: 406-541-2677

Fax: 406-541-2676

— Mail —

Adventure Life

1655 S 3rd St. W

Suite 1

Missoula, MT 59801

http://adventure-life.com/

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Last year, Morgan’s company sent 1,400 people to exotic places all over Central and South America, and he is expecting even larger numbers this year. Adventure Life guides people through 10 different countries, including Peru, Ecuador, Argentina and Guatemala. The group sizes max out at 12, with about eight people on average traveling together.

Morgan said his type of traveler is a little more adventurous than the average person. When the rest of the travel industry was sagging due to Sept. 11, he said his business was doing just fine, thanks to the brave spirit of his clientele.

“A lot of these people are less risk-adverse,” he said. “They’re willing to accept more risk while they’re traveling.”

These people come from as far away as Hong Kong and as close as just across the Higgins Avenue Bridge, but not very many come from either. A business run by people who have lived in Montana (and many who were educated here), Adventure Life sees next-to-nothing of local action. Located at 1655 S Third St. W., the business is run out of an unmarked tan and white house. The backdoor provides the building’s only access, and only an 8-by-11-inch sheet of paper hanging on the door tells those who are interested that, yes, this IS the place.

Instead, Adventure Life recruits customers at places where the “adventure lifer” may be in abundance. Morgan places ads in magazines like Outdoors and National Geographic, hits up travel shows in New York and Chicago and gets his company listed in guidebooks. He also runs a 600-page plus Web site (www.adventurelifejourneys.com) to let potential customers learn about his business and the exotic trips they’re offering.

Despite the lack of local customers, Morgan considers Adventure Life to be a local Missoula business as legitimate as those selling residents their groceries or renting them their DVDs. He may provide services to people mostly from out of the area, but by doing so he’ s importing money into the Montana economy and sending out something else.

“I export the brain power of western Montana,” he said, drawing a comparison to the way a mining company would export its fuels or medals. Both make money for the area by selling what they have at their disposal to other places.

Morgan is also strict about keeping the jobs he provides local.

“These are career jobs,” he said of the eight full-time employees who show up to the office everyday. “I want people who are stable, who are already located here.”

For the future, Morgan sees the business prospects on the rise, due in part to American culture’s continued cross-pollination with that of Latin America. He listens to the songs on the radio and looks at what’s on our dinner plates and hears and sees indications that his business is only going to get better.

“Ten years ago, there would be one (record from a Latin-American artist on the charts), and from Europe there would be seven,” he said. “Now, the tide has swung back the other way. Eating Mexican is like eating pizza now. To me, that shows how closely our countries have grown.”

Copyright 2004
Missoulian.com