Tauck is an operator of guided tours and river cruises. The company is owned and operated by the Tauck family and is based in Wilton, Connecticut. Tauck offers more than 100 guided land journeys, small-ship ocean cruises, European river cruises, safaris and family travel experiences in more than 70 countries, and it has received numerous accolades.
History
Tauck was founded in 1925 by Arthur Tauck, Sr., then a young traveling salesman, when he brought six paying guests along on one of his sales trips through New England and southeastern Canada. The all-inclusive, six-day trip covered 1,100 miles and cost each guest $69. The group traveled in the mornings and guests relaxed in the afternoons while Tauck made sales calls to local clients. At first Tauck planned no additional tours, but when word-of-mouth recommendations from his six passengers resulted in numerous inquiries about additional trips, he reconsidered. Tauck soon launched Tauck Tours and began promoting his guided journeys in earnest. In 1935 it became the first tour operator to be awarded a federal Tour Broker’s License by the U.S. government. In 1958 Arthur Tauck, Sr. was succeeded by his son, Arthur Tauck, Jr., who expanded the company by adding additional domestic and later international destinations to its portfolio. The younger Tauck is widely regarded as a travel industry innovator, and he is credited with a number of “firsts” including combining motorcoach tours with air travel in the 1950s, offering the first international charter air tour packages in Nova Scotia, bringing many of the first East Coast travelers to the U.S. National Parks of the American West, and introducing “heli hiking” in the Canadian Rockies.
Today
Today Tauck offers over 140 different all-inclusive, guided journeys in more than 70 countries worldwide. Travel categories offered by Tauck include land journeys, European river cruises, small ship ocean cruises, Tauck Bridges family travel adventures, special Tauck events, and so-called Tauck Culturious trips. The latter, geared toward baby boomers and launched in 2009, focus on actively exploring smaller geographic regions. The Tauck company is still a family-owned and -operated enterprise. Arthur Tauck, Jr. serves as Chairman. Four of Arthur Tauck's five children have either worked for or are currently involved in the business, and his son-in-law Dan Mahar is Tauck’s current CEO and a Board Director. Tauck is a member of the United States Tour Operators Association, and the National Tour Association, which was founded by Arthur Tauck, Jr. in 1954 as the United States Tour Brokers Association.
In September 2010, Tauck announced a partnership with the documentary filmmaker Ken Burns and his longtime collaborator Dayton Duncan to tailor land journeys and special events to topics covered in Burns’ films, including the Civil War, America’s national parks, jazz and baseball. The partnership has three components:
Original short films produced by Burns and Duncan that provide their perspectives on people and places featured in their documentaries, while travelers are visiting the areas under discussion.
Tauck has also entered into a partnership with BBC Earth, the brand responsible for marketing and distributing such nature documentaries as Life, The Blue Planet, Frozen Planet and Planet Earth. This Earth Journeys partnership pairs exclusive original documentaries with visits to locations highlighting animal life and the natural world. Some such journeys make use of BBC Earth technologies such as long-range directional microphones, infra-red night-vision and motion-activated cameras, underwater cameras, and small fiber-optic endoscopic cameras.
Awards
In early 2017, TravAlliance Media named Tauck the Best Escorted Tour Operator, Family. The previous year, the company was named the Best European River Cruise Line by the website , and that same year also gave Tauck the nod as the Best River Cruise line for Dining. In 2015, Tauck was named the Best Tour Operator, U.S. & Canada by Travel Weekly magazine, and the Best Destination & Experience Escorted Tour Partner by the travel agency group Virtuoso. Tauck’s river cruises were also honored with a Travel Weekly magazine Magellan Gold Award in 2015. In 2014, 2013 and 2011 Tauck was voted the “World’s Best River Cruise Line” by the readers of Travel + Leisure magazine. The company was also named the “World’s Best Tour Operator & Safari Outfitter” three times by the readers of the magazine. In 2013, Tauck was named the number-one tour operator by travel agency groups Virtuoso, Ensemble and Nexion, and the world-leader in culinary tours by Saveur magazine. In 2012, Tauck was named the "Best Luxury River Cruise Line" by the website CruiseReport.com and the "World's Best River Cruise Line for Families" by Travel + Leisures readers. Tauck was also named the #1 mid-sized company to work for in southwestern Connecticut in 2015 in the Top Workplaces Awards by Hearst Media. Likewise in 2013, Tauck was named one of the "Best Places To Work in Connecticut" by the Hartford Business Journal.
