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Our Team Building Process Why do food tours create natural team building? It’s simple. People bond easily over food. Connections and communication are fostered. Add in a little challenge and collaboration also rises in the group without effort. At Alberta Food Tours, we’ve found that as office teams are coming back together after the isolation…

At Alberta Food Tours sustainability goes far beyond using recycled paper in our printer. Our company has been engaging in responsible tourism since our inception in 2006, leading the way in environmental, cultural, and economic sustainability where we work and live. Guests who take our tours can feel good about choosing an activity that:  …

There was lots to be grateful this past year and here are Alberta Food Tours’ Top Highlights for 2021.  We are sending out a HUGE thank you to all who supported our Eat The Castle and private in-person tours, the Alberta Food Finder food tour games and our immensely successful Alberta Cares Packages.  We exist…

15 years! Alberta Food Tours (AFT) has thrived for 15 years in business. That’s right. We started in April of 2006. That’s an incredible achievement by any standard but given Alberta will lose almost half of all tourism businesses because of the devastating effects of Covid-19 on our sector, the fact that we are staying…

2019 – The Year of Canadian Signature Experiences for Alberta Food Tours (AFT) 2019 was a fantastic year for our company. Why? Because, Destination Canada designated both our Inglewood Edibles: Made by Mavericks in Calgary and our Eat the Castle in Banff as Canadian Signature Experiences. So, that means Tourism Canada recommends them as “Must-See, Must-Do” experiences. They are recognized because they help visitors understand what Canada – and Canadians – are all about. Magazines, bloggers and content creators also loved us this year. We ran some seriously fun contests. And, our team of 20 talented guides delivered hundreds of tours around the province. Read on for a summary of all the action. January Writer Don Nichols featured us in his Private Clubs Magazine article: 5 Good Reasons To Visit Calgary We signed an agreement with Classic Vacations to become…

We are celebrating! For six summers now, we’ve kept two beehives with the help of our mentor Eliese Watson the founder of Apiaries and Bees for Communities . Five years ago we moved the bees to the garden of our business partner Rouge Restaurant in Inglewood and both the garden and the bees are better for it. Rouge owners Paul Rogalski and Olivier Reynaud say that the bees have clearly doubled the pollination and harvest yield of their garden. Last year, we harvested 80 pound of honey from our two hives and left that much more for the bees to overwinter on. Beekeeping is a skill that requires mentoring.   As president of Alberta Food Tours, I was moved to start keeping bees when I heard that although large commercial scale bees were suffering colony collapse disorder, urban bees, with…

2019 is a year where Alberta Food Tours is recognized for our ability to create unforgettable moments for visitors. First, in February, Destination Canada designated our Inglewood Edibles: Made by Mavericks tour as a Canadian Signature Experience (CSE). Now, in partnership with the Fairmont Banff Springs Hotel (FBSH), our Eat the Castle tour has just received the same designation. This means that these tours are part of Destination Canada’s permanent collection of must-see, must-do experiences for visitors to Canada. Travel Alberta explains that “CSE is a curated collection of over 200 unforgettable travel experiences offered by Canadians who are passionate to share their extraordinary part of the country with international visitors. The program helps change international perceptions of travelling within Canada and broaden the view of what Canada has to offer.” Marty Eberth, Vice President of Travel Alberta adds, “Visitors…

There is no offseason The nicest thing has happened. We don’t really have an off-season anymore. In the photos above, you see our guide Nora Comerford-Seto with Santa on our last tour of 2018 at the Fairmont Banff Springs on December 21. The photo beside it is a private tour we did for ATB in Canmore on January 6. Hallelujah! It was great to only have three weeks as our offseason. Quiet activities Overall, November to April are quieter than May through October when we are in full swing. That’s important for me as a business owner and serial entrepreneur. I also have a writing and publishing company and a spice box importing company and am currently working on a new South Indian cookbook. I need some balancing time to pursue these other passions and to take care of myself….

THE MAKING OF A CANADIAN SIGNATURE EXPERIENCE – YOU’VE GOT TO START SOMEWHERE When I started Alberta Food Tours in 2006, I focused on tours that showcased the breadth and depth of Calgary’s diverse food scene. I’d hire a van and driver to transport guests to all four corners of the city. We captured tastes…

  What’s your business model, cash flow projection, break even point and profitability targets? Questions like this used to make my head spin. If I’m honest, they still do. But now, I just take a deep gulp of fresh air and dive in and figure it out – with the help of the wonderful team I now work with. You see, for the first few decades of my working life I was a Nurse Practitioner. I never needed to think about the bottom line let alone marketing or advertising. In the health care biz, people were always lined up out the door. It was gratifying career caring for people and helping them manage their diseases. Until the day it wasn’t. Something changed in me. I developed a deep desire to work with healthy people and help them stay that way….