Skift IDEA Awards 2024: Meet the Winners

INDUSTRY INNOVATORS
Category: Activities & Attractions

Voyages Indigenous Tourism Australia | Wintjiri Wiṟu: Bringing an Ancient Indigenous Story to Life

Developed over five years, at an investment of over $10 million, Wintjiri Wiṟu brings to life an ancient Indigenous story through spectacular choreographed drones, lasers and projections illuminating the skies above Uluru. It’s a surreal, culturally immersive experience that’s also the world’s largest permanent drone show.

Every element of the show has been guided by Aṉangu – the traditional owners of Uluṟu – to ensure their ancient story is told in the right way. Launched on 10 May 2023, over 1,100 drones take flight each night.

From a purpose-built, sustainable theater, guests can enjoy Wintjiri Wiṟu in three ways; with a signature three-hour Sunset Dinner, or a shorter 1.5-hour Twilight / After Dark viewing. Narrated by Aṉangu themselves in Pitjantjatjara and Yankunytjatjara languages, the score also features traditional Inma – sacred ceremonial music. Each experience is accompanied by gourmet fare, premium beverages and impeccable service.

INDUSTRY INNOVATORS
Category: Airlines & Airports

SkyTeam | SkyTeam’s Carry-on Calculator

With more than 30 million codeshare or multi-carrier flights offered every year, SkyTeam is always innovating to make travel easier for the millions of customers connecting between SkyTeam members.

Hand baggage allowance can vary between airlines. Not knowing if they are bringing the correct amount of carry-on for every flight causes customers stress, while trying to find out individual airlines’ carry-on policies takes time and is inconvenient.

In a very quick, agile and enthusiastic approach, SkyTeam created the Carry-on Calculator. Designed and built in-house, this addresses the disparity in hand baggage allowance between different airlines. allowing customers to review all the hand luggage policies for the carriers in their itinerary. The tool provides them with the most restrictive airline policy and gives them a breakdown of number of items allowed including size and weight.

Highly Commended | Alaska Airlines: The Next Generation of Search, Powered by AI

INDUSTRY INNOVATORS
Category: Business Travel

Radisson Hotel Group | Book It Easy

Radisson Hotel Group (RHG) aimed to revolutionize the hospitality landscape with its “Radisson Meetings” value proposition and pioneering digital platform, which allows meeting organizers to book meetings and events directly via the Group’s website and app in real-time.

This “Book It Easy” tool has been seamlessly integrated into the Group’s internal booking management system and has set a new standard in customer convenience and satisfaction as well as providing an award-winning digital innovation.

“Book it Easy” is now available in over 160 hotels, including all RHG’s key conference hotels in EMEA.

INDUSTRY INNOVATORS
Category: Hotels

TFE Hotels | MM:NT Berlin Lab: Rethinking How the Hospitality Industry Approaches Innovation

Recognising that the way people traveled and worked had changed due to the pandemic, in 2022, a small project team from TFE Hotels in Europe took the opportunity to examine the value expectations of future travelers that led to the creation of a six-room-micro-hotel in Berlin that operates in beta mode.

This innovative, digital-first ‘lab’ enables the continuous testing/reconfiguration of the hospitality experience, including design, amenities, and sustainable materials, with real-time-feedback from guests. MM:NT has conducted a two-month experiment where guests were crowdsourced via social media and invited to stay for free and provide real-time qualitative feedback.

By recreating fully functional hotel rooms in a controlled, yet public, lab environment and using an agile, iterative process typically seen in software development, TFE can test new configurations, designs, and sustainable products in a live feedback loop, providing the opportunity to adapt hotel designs and bring them to market quicker – something not usually possible when opening a traditional hotel.

INDUSTRY INNOVATORS
Category: Tour Operators

Rustic Pathways | Paving the Way for Transformative Student Travel

Rustic Pathways seeks to empower students to positively impact lives and communities around the globe, creating a world where travel is accepted as an essential part of education, where travel is a model for sustainable development, where all people are connected by a shared humanity and all decisions are made with a global perspective.

Whether it’s volunteering on community-led projects or engaging in cross-cultural exchanges, Rustic Pathways empowers travelers to become active participants in their adventures, fostering empathy, understanding, and personal growth. Rustic Pathways designs each travel itinerary with precision, purpose, passion and adventure in order to transform the ordinary teen travel moments into extraordinary memories.

With impactful change currently taking place in over 20 countries through 103 different programs, Rustic Pathways’ long-term objective is to continue expanding its reach, developing programs in new destinations around the world in order to help communities in need.

Highly Commended | Apple Leisure Group Vacations: Beach Finder: Destination-less & Date-less Travel Search

INDUSTRY INNOVATORS
Category: Tourism

Travel Alberta | Pioneering Development of Diverse, Year-Round Destination Zones

While Canada’s tourism began in Banff and Lake Louise National Parks 100 years ago, Alberta’s tourism has not expanded much beyond these regions, stymieing growth elsewhere.

Travel Alberta sought an innovative, sustainable approach to province-wide tourism development. The Travel Alberta’s Tourism Development Zone (TDZ) initiative identified 10 zones across Alberta – chosen for their potential to become world-class tourist destinations – and uses advanced data analytics, including GIS spatial data, travel consumer demand data, macroeconomic data, and social media sentiment analysis, to guide strategies tailored each area’s unique needs, ensuring sustainability and economic viability.

By extending tourist itineraries beyond well-known destinations, the initiative spreads the economic benefits of tourism across the province and mitigates over-tourism’s ecological impacts. It creates a year-round tourism narrative that enhances Alberta’s appeal to domestic and international visitors.

INDUSTRY INNOVATORS
Category: Visionary 2030 in Partnership with Allianz Partners

Tomu Inc. | Enabling Aspiring Hosts and Hoteliers to Build Beyond Boundaries

Tomu’s Prefab Villa Collection & Modular Building System is designed to enable the creation of unique hospitality concepts and make hospitality ownership more accessible, while meeting the evolving preferences of modern travelers.

Tomu offers two main solutions: the Villa Collection and the Modular Building System. Tomu systems address common industry construction challenges such as higher costs, long build timelines, and logistical difficulties of remote locations, with all prefabricated units being manufactured at Tomu’s facility, delivered to the site nearly complete, and installed in a matter of days, significantly reducing overall development times.

CHANGE MAKERS
Category: Leadership

Adam Stewart | Executive Chairman, Sandals Resorts International

A proud citizen and son of the Caribbean, Adam Stewart is Executive Chairman of Sandals Resorts International (SRI), the company founded by his late father, Gordon “Butch” Stewart and the organization behind the world’s most recognized brands of all-inclusive resorts.

Deeply committed to the region, Stewart has tirelessly worked to make the economic engine of tourism work for all. He is an appointed member of the Executive Committee of the World Travel & Tourism Council (WTTC) and Founder and President of the Sandals Foundation, the nonprofit created to continue and expand upon the philanthropic work SRI has undertaken.

Stewart was conferred by the Government of Jamaica with the Order of Distinction, one of the country’s most prestigious recognitions, and appointed by the Prime Minister of Jamaica as Ambassador/Special Investment Envoy to drive innovation, investment and economic growth in Jamaica.

Southwest Airlines | Repurpose with Purpose

Through Southwest Airlines’ environmental sustainability initiative, Repurpose with Purpose, aircraft seat leather is transformed into new products while providing skills training, employment, and other benefits for communities across the United States and Central America.

The program was founded in 2014 after Southwest Airlines updated their seat design, resulting in 43 acres of aircraft seat leather which was no longer needed, and in the 10 years since launch, the program has grown to include 12 partners benefitting diverse communities, including veterans, active-military members, women overcoming addiction, students, artisans, rural and indigenous communities, survivors of human trafficking, and people experiencing homelessness.

Since 2014, Southwest has donated more than $2M in grant funding and more than 1.4M pounds of leather.

CHANGE MAKERS
Category: Sustainability

Trafalgar Travel | We’re saying NO to ”More Stuff”

In an industry-first, Trafalgar Travel, along with its sister TTC Tour Brands, said ‘no to more stuff,’ ending merchandise and ‘swag’ giveaways due to their environmental impact.

In mid-2023, as part of Trafalgar’s Climate Action plan commitments, the carbon emissions produced by TTC Tour Brands were assessed with results showing that the branded merchandise given away throughout the year equated to an extra 2,500 tonnes of carbon emissions globally – the equivalent of 6.5 million car-driven miles.

In December 2023, Trafalgar Travel ended the purchase of all branded merchandise designed to be given away. Instead, reallocating funds to invest in projects that fight climate change by donating to nature-based climate solutions supported by the TreadRight Foundation.

CHANGE MAKERS
Category: Rising Star

Kristi Gole | EVP, Strategy, Global Hotel Alliance

Kristi Gole is EVP of Strategy at Global Hotel Alliance, the world’s largest alliance of independent hotel brands with 40 brands and 800 hotels in 100 countries.

With a mission to help independent brands compete, Kristi was part of the original team in this startup and helped build the brand, the global marketing team, and the first-of-its-kind experiential loyalty program – GHA DISCOVERY – from the ground-up.

It now has 27 million members driving US$2.3B in revenue and has won 120 awards for its innovation, with Kristi being responsible for enhancing the value proposition of the GHA DISCOVERY program, getting the word out, and strategically growing the business.

CHANGE MAKERS
Category: DEI Champion

Vail Resorts | Epic for Everyone: The Vail Resorts Inclusive Access Program

Vail Resorts is a network of destination and close-to-home ski resorts with 42 resorts in four countries – all accessible on the company’s industry-changing, multi-resort Epic Pass.

The Vail Resorts Inclusive Access program provides grants to, and partners with, organizations across North America, including SOS Outreach, Boys & Girls Clubs, the CHILL Foundation, the National Brotherhood of Snowsports and more than 165 other partners, across 37 resorts.

The Inclusive Access program focuses on removing barriers to skiing and riding in three areas: for youth – especially youth of color in urban areas, adaptive access for people with disabilities, and continued access programs that solve for eligibility gaps by ensuring continued support for adults and partner organization alumni with access to the sport and the outdoor industry.

CREATIVE THINKERS
Category: Content

Tourisme Montréal | Bring the Flame to Montréal

As the eyes of the world turned to Paris for the 2024 Olympics, Tourisme Montréal recognized a golden opportunity to engage its French population, one of its critical target audiences. The challenge wasn’t simply reaching them but competing for their attention during what would be a saturated media environment. Timing, and execution, would be everything — and all of this on a minimal media budget relative to the big advertising players.

In response, Tourisme Montréal created the “Bring the Flame to Montréal” campaign, a lighthearted, tongue-in-cheek appeal to have the famed Olympic Torch Relay pass through Montréal on its way to Paris. The goal was to leverage the excitement of the relay and highlight the powerful connection between the peoples of France and Québec. The idea was predicated on the interesting fact that there are more French people in Montréal than almost half of the French cities the relay would pass through. It provided a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to dialogue with France in a wholly unique and playful way while celebrating a special relationship.

CREATIVE THINKERS
Category: Marketing

Visit Philadelphia | In Pursuit of a More Perfect Union

“In Pursuit of a More Perfect Union” showcases Philadelphia as the premier welcoming and inclusive destination in the U.S. in a way that only the birthplace of the nation can.

The campaign was designed to offer a fresh take on Philadelphia’s commemoration of history and heritage months, speaking to the unique role that America’s birthplace plays during these observances. For Visit Philadelphia, it offered an opportunity to build emotional connections with potential visitors and amplify the work done to invite diverse audiences 365 days a year.

In Pursuit of a More Perfect Union is designed to show off Philadelphia as the premier welcoming and inclusive destination in the U.S. and drive visitation to the region now and in the lead up to the country’s 250th anniversary in 2026.

CREATIVE THINKERS
Category: Physical Experiences

Alliance for Downtown New York | A Walking Tour Incubator Grant Program for Lower Manhattan’s Tourism Entrepreneurs

In 2023, the Alliance for Downtown New York launched its first-ever Walking Tour Incubator Grant Program to uplift locally-based tourism entrepreneurs and create walking experiences that illuminate Lower Manhattan’s lesser-known stories, transcending its popular financial history.

The five winning walking tour entrepreneurs underwent a rigorous two-month incubator led by the Alliance, and each winner received a grant of up to $12,500 to help develop, launch and scale their walking tour. In addition to the five grant recipients, there were six runners up who received a spot at the tour guide training organization TripSchool (valued at $999) to support the continued development of their downtown tours.

Highly Commended | BRC Imagination Arts: The Legend of Luna

CREATIVE THINKERS
Category: Creative Design

Clicktivated for Visit Greater Palm Springs | Transforming Destination Marketing and Driving ROI with Interactive Video

Clicktivated partnered with Visit Palm Springs & Visit Greater Palm Springs to develop an innovative series of interactive videos to help showcase the destination’s many diverse attractions and increase engagement & ROI.

This multi-year collaboration aimed to enhance the travel experience, allowing viewers to go from dreaming to booking by empowering them to engage directly with specific attractions within the video, such as restaurants, hotels, shops, parks, tours and outdoor activities.

By integrating Clicktivated’s technology, Palm Springs connected more effectively with potential visitors and provided a personalized and memorable experience.

PROBLEM SOLVERS
Category: Business Outcomes

Streamline One by Inhabit | Transforming Vacation Property Management with an All-in-One Platform

Streamline One is designed to deliver tangible business results for property management companies (PMCs) in the vacation rental management industry.

This comprehensive platform integrates core property management functions, customer relationship management, revenue management, payment processing, mobile solutions, insurance, website and marketing, call solutions, training and learning management, and guest verification and employee screening into a unified system.

PROBLEM SOLVERS
Category: Data Provider

Destination Canada | From Insights to Impact: Canada’s Groundbreaking Tourism Data Collective is Harnessing Data and AI to Power a Transformative Tourism Future

The Data Collective is a groundbreaking initiative designed to centralize and democratize access to tourism data across Canada. This secure and accessible platform provides tourism stakeholders with real-time insights, performance indicators, and advanced analytics. Key objectives include enhancing data-driven decision-making, fostering collaboration among tourism partners, and driving innovation within the sector.

Fueled by a comprehensive engine of over 175 diverse and ever-growing data sources and covering more than 5,100 regions, the Data Collective offers rich supply and demand-side data, such as traveler arrivals, spending, occupancy rates, tourism infrastructure, and geospatial data. These insights are crucial for strategic planning and growth within the tourism industry.

Launched in the spring of this year, the Data Collective is the first of its kind and is poised to revolutionize the Canadian tourism landscape. By equipping stakeholders with powerful data and AI-enabled tools to navigate challenges, seize opportunities, and foster sustainable growth, it contributes to the sector’s long-term success and resilience.

TRAVEL TECHNOLOGY
Category: Operational Streamlining

FLYR | Unlocking Freedom to Innovate for the Travel Industry

While the rest of the world embraces AI and modern retailing experiences, travel and transportation has been stuck with legacy vendors stacking AI on top of legacy analytical models, creating a chain of dependencies that may limit the value creation of more recent AI advancements for airlines. FLYR closes that gap.

Leveraging AI, FLYR’s product suite is optimized to create more tailored, personalized offers through AI-powered customer segmentation, in addition to connecting siloed internal systems and streamlining data workflows. FLYR’s AI-driven forecasting and pricing capabilities, enable airlines to deliver the personalized, Amazon-like ecommerce experiences that today’s travelers want.

From seat selection to in-flight amenities, non-air products and vacation experiences, FLYR empowers airlines to tap into the full potential of their data, enabling real-time decision making that drives innovation and exceptional customer experiences across the entire travel journey.

TRAVEL TECHNOLOGY
Category: Workforce Efficiency

TravelPerk | Using Technology to Enhance, Not Replace, Our Employees

TravelPerk is one of the fastest growing SaaS companies, focused on building the number one travel management platform in the US and Europe that solves real customer pain points rather than building front-end products that look good, but in reality, make the customer’s journey less efficient.

TravelPerk’s approach to innovation is to automate manual tasks so customer-facing teams can offer a better human experience, whilst building efficiencies throughout business operations.

TravelPerk’s open-API technology allows over 45 partners to integrate seamlessly, with a travel inventory that boasts 20 NDC connections (as of June 2024).

Highly Commended | Deem: Designing for Everyone

TRAVEL TECHNOLOGY
Category: Traveler Journey

Travel Alberta | Immersing Users in a One-of-a-Kind 3D Itinerary

Alberta is a place with larger-than-life experiences—like the soaring Banff Gondola and the awe-inspiring Icefields Parkway. But demonstrating the breadth of Alberta’s offerings while standing out in a competitive field of tourism marketing is a perennial challenge.

Travel Alberta hoped to reach international travellers who were familiar with Canada, but not Alberta, envisioning a tool that would help them visualize Alberta’s attractions as well as their own journey through our physical and cultural terrain. Knowing how popular road trips and itineraries are with travellers, Travel Alberta challenged themselves to immerse users in a one-of-a-kind 3D itinerary. By bringing Alberta to the world, they could, in turn, inspire the world to visit Alberta.

Highly Commended | Joyned: A Social Revenue Technology Pioneer

TRAVEL TECHNOLOGY
Category: Sustainability Tech

Thrust Carbon | Effortless Climate Compliance

Thrust Carbon are on a mission to make travel and events effortlessly green. Its vision is a world where our actions don’t have to cost the Earth, and purpose is to provide solutions that accurately and effectively manage carbon emissions so that its clients can make climate-smart decisions, reach net-zero, and comply with a complex network of sustainability regulations.

The product, Thrust Engage, bridges intelligent reporting with sustainable decision-making by identifying and taking action on opportunities to reduce carbon emissions. It seamlessly embeds sustainable choices into corporate travel decisions and enables informed decisions with a foundation in sustainability, all while simplifying supplier negotiations and navigating traveller options.

TRAVEL TECHNOLOGY
Category: Best Use of AI

PolyAI | Guest-led Voice Assistants Built for CX

With deployments in hotels, restaurants and other traveler-obsessed verticals around the world, PolyAI voice assistants understand customers, regardless of what they say or how they say it – an essential piece to phone-based automated support that’s been absent or done poorly based on legacy systems.

PolyAI serves enterprises where customer conversation is an important part of doing business, including transformative visionaries in hospitality and travel (like Marriott, Wyndham, Caesars Entertainment, Gaylord Properties, Carnival UK, Hopper, Premier Inn, Landry’s/Golden Nugget and more), home services, insurance, energy, retail, healthcare and telecomms, as well as NGOs and organizations in the public sector.

PolyAI’s goal is to be the voice behind half of all AI-powered customer service calls globally within the next five years.

Highly Commended | eviivo: eviivo Concierge