Families Able to Unlock Travel for Remote Work Through Virtual School Networks

For all the talk about untethering from our homes and the golden age of travel, there’s one barrier that remains: children.

Many parents probably do want to see the world while working remotely, but most would shudder at the thought of returning to virtual classrooms imposed on them during the pandemic.

Fortunately, there’s a growing movement around virtual school networks, while new platforms are emerging to ease families into the nomadic life — or at least a few months somewhere nice without feeling guilty they’re neglecting their kids’ education.

The crossover potential with travel is huge; there are an estimated 33 million families in the U.S., so this is a relatively big, and largely untapped, market. While platforms such as Remote Year focus on single digital nomads, there’s equally an opportunity to program itineraries for cohorts of families in the future.

One company, The Family Workation, is aiming to give parents a taste of the location-independent lifestyle.

“It’s logistically difficult to set up the structure to embark on this path, so this is what we help with,” said Kate Shifman, founder of The Family Workation, which offers coworking retreats and summer camps for digital nomad families in Portugal.

She said there were two groups emerging. One is the family who are happy where they are now, but because they now work remotely, they’re thinking about living in a nicer place. They’re not going to move, but go for a couple of weeks or two months.

However, that can act as a stepping stone to longer stays, she said.

“Then the other group are parents who had been thinking about unleashing themselves, from the system let’s say. The pandemic made the decision process easier.”

Summer camps are one thing, but there are more structured options, thanks to virtual schools. Different schemes include Galileo, for “modern active families who want a self-directed education for their children,” and online education platform VPKid. Charter Schools are also growing in popularity.

Shifman, who was speaking during a Work From Anywhere Team webinar, said she’s considering partnering with these platforms. “We’re setting up a room for parents to do their co-working, but then a room for children of similar ages that are enrolled in the same program. We’re looking at this model.” Some locations will have local schooling options too, she added.

When the School Becomes the Destination

Another school network on her radar is Green School, which has sites in Indonesia, Mexico, New Zealand and South Africa.

Its Bali site offers a “co-learning space,” The Bridge, which was set up by Christopher Thompson. He wants to dispel some of the myths around homeschooling. “People think, oh my god, I’ve got to get the books, I’ve got to do this, got to sit next to the kid,” he said, speaking at the webinar. “And that is not what homeschooling is at all. That’s maybe a portion of it.”

The main theme with Green School is that children tap into their local surroundings, and communities, and parents are encouraged to share those experiences.

“I see my friends in New York toiling away for six-figure salaries, which means nothing because they’re completed disconnected from themselves and their children, and they have to send the kids away to overpriced summer camps and day camps,” Shifman said. “They provide skills, but the connection between parents and children is broken, and that’s something I’d like to help fix with The Family Workcation.”

It may be like a niche market for now, but further ahead, let’s consider the pandemic creates a sizeable generation of digital nomads. Will having babies stop them in their tracks? Probably not.

“There have been digital nomads traveling the world. We’re now in 2021, and a lot of them are now digital nomad parents. This will become an emerging trend, more people will become open to exploring it,” said John Lee, co-founder of the Work From Anywhere Team.

Sidenotes

Savvy marketers aren’t letting a good crisis go to waste, and making the most of the remote work disruption caused by the pandemic. If it’s good enough for travel, it’s good enough for breweries and car manufacturers too.

With a nice twist on WeWork, Busch has come up with TreeWork. The brewery has built a coworking space in the Colorado wilderness, with office space, Wi-Fi, on-site grilling, campfires and, obviously, Busch Light happy hours. Workers can also camp the night there.

It’s not as ridiculous as it sounds, with other organizations also tapping into the power of nature to stimulate creativity. Busch cites research conducted by OnePoll that suggests 29 minutes spent outdoors results in a 45 percent increase in productivity. “Busch Light champions all things outdoors because we know the powerful impact that simply being outside can have,” said Daniel Blake, group vice president, Budweiser and Value at Anheuser-Busch.

Meanwhile Volkswagen is cashing in, and has designed a concept vehicle called the Orbis, built with business travelers in mind. The car manufacturer teamed up with the Academy of Art University in San Francisco on a special project, with students asked to come up with future mobility concepts for long-distance traveling. Scholarships were given to the students who came up the best examples.

The Orbis is a self-driving vehicle with its own lounge, where business travelers can rest and arrive refreshed at their destination. Other concepts included the Urban Cowboy and Outreach, part-car, part-home and designed for the “lifestyle for the modern nomad.”

Citroen has also had a go, teaming up with Accor and advertising company JCDecaux to form the Urban Collectif. The thinking here is that the three brands have an “international presence in the daily lives of city-dwellers around the world and a shared vision for the future of urban mobility.”

Accor said it’s “inventing mobile hospitality in the city” enabling all of its customers as well as city-dwellers to immerse themselves in its brand experience outside its hotel walls.

10-Second Corporate Travel Catch-Up

Who and what Skift has covered over the past week: Air France, Amadeus, McKinsey, Oyo, Sonesta, TravelPerk, United Airlines.

In Brief

Former Trivago and Egenicia Bosses Invest in Meeting App 

There’s a future in the meeting planning space, according to Steve Singh, the co-founder of Concur, as he’s just rounded up a few travel industry pals to invest $8 million in Troop. The fundraise was led by his Madrona Venture Group, while other supporters included Trivago founder Rolf Schromgens, former Egencia president Rob Greyber, and former SAP Concur presidents Jim Lucier and Mike Eberhard. Troop said the money will be used to build out the booking and expense functionality “to provide a truly end to end service.” Singh recently pumped $34 million into travel tech firm Spotnana.

Corporate Travel Agencies Double Down on Sustainability

TravelPerk has bought UK corporate travel sustainability consultancy firm Susterra, its fourth acquisition to date. Susterra uses data analytics to offer companies a better view of their business travel-related environmental impact. TripActions meanwhile has announced a partnership with Neste, which produces sustainable aviation fuel; this fuel will now be offered to all of its corporate customers. ATPI Group on Thursday launched a new division called Halo, which will be an “incubator of new ideas and services focused around sustainability designed to support each of the existing client-focused business units around the world.” And American Express Global Business Travel joined as a member of the Global Sustainable Tourism Council this week.