How to travel for free and get travel perks
When you become a Group Coordinator, seeing the world for free is just the beginning. Check out how you also stack up travel rewards and, even better, how to spend them.
With more than 200 handcrafted itineraries, the option to create Private Tours, and a team of travel experts at your side, our group travel program makes seeing the world easy. Cruise our tour pages and find the perfect adventure for you and your friends, or create a Customized Tour with the help of our travel experts based on your own interests. Think: Bridgerton filming locations or visiting your ancestors’ homes with your siblings—the possibilities are as vast as our world. Plus, we offer ways for you to go for free.
How to travel the world for free
Become a Group Coordinator for Go Ahead and get one complimentary place on tour for every six people you bring with you. All you have to do is choose a tour and organize a group of travel-loving, adventurous globetrotters. There’s no limit to the number of free spots you can get, which means as your travel family grows, so do the free trips and rewards. It really is the best side hustle that allows you to travel for free.
More ways to get free travel
Our Group Coordinator program is the key to how to travel the world for free with our industry-leading loyalty program. As a Group Coordinator, you stack up daily rewards per traveler, which grow with every trip you take as a travel leader. These Global Rewards points offer perks beyond lifelong friendships and bucket list moments. See all the ways to spend these travel points and how some of our top Group Coordinators like to use theirs.
How to spend your Global Rewards points
1. Set off on (another) free Go Ahead tour
If you’re wondering how to travel the world for free, our reward system allows you to take even more complimentary trips with us beyond the ones you organize as a travel leader. “It’s like opening a beautifully wrapped gift when I see my Global Rewards points updated!” said Group Coordinator Carol. “Having a serious case of wanderlust, I love using my points for not only Convention Tours, but also for joining other Go Ahead tours.” That’s right, you can use your points to purchase any trip through Go Ahead. “I have saved up my Global Rewards points for a few years and let my husband choose a tour out of the Go Ahead catalog,” said Group Coordinator Judy, who took her husband on our London, Normandy & Paris tour for free.
Share the gift of free travel, like Judy, and give your best friend, cousin, spouse—anyone—a place on one of our tours. With more than 200 expertly crafted itineraries to pick from—plus the option to customize a tour—whomever you give your free spot to has one tough decision ahead of them: which tour to choose. (Your tough choice is which friend to give the trip to!) Group Coordinator Linda occasionally uses her points to help make tours more attainable for travelers. “If somebody has a hardship, I give points away,” she said. “If somebody is considering not going, I can help them out. The rewards to me are priceless.”
2. Book or upgrade flights
After banking your free trip by taking six or more friends on tour, you can use your Global Rewards points for flights outside of trips with Go Ahead. Purchase tickets through our Travel Team and enjoy discounted prices. Plus, you can upgrade any flight using your Global Rewards points—also at a discount. (And don’t forget—you can share this perk with your friends and family, too!) So, before you move that trip out of the group chat and onto a plane, call us for help saving money. “As soon as travel opened a teeny-tiny bit post-pandemic, I used points to book a flight straight to my brother’s in Germany, where I stayed for two weeks,” said Group Coordinator Sarah. Are you wondering how to travel for free and get paid? Our Group Coordinator program also offers payment opportunities for people who want to organize trips but can't always join them.
3. Go ahead, extend your OOO
Not ready to go home at the end of your trips? You can use your Global Rewards points to add an extension to any tour. If you’re heading out on our Kenya Culture & Wildlife Safari: Samburu to Maasai Mara tour, add the Southern Kenya extension and don’t miss the chance to spot Maasai lions, elephants, black rhinos, and more at Tsavo National Park. Or, choose to extend your Portugal Food & Wine: Porto to Lisbon with America’s Test Kitchen tour and dive into the sun-drenched Algarve region. An extension purchased with your Global Rewards points is the cherry on top of all the free travel you’ve worked so hard for. So, go ahead, take a few more days off!
4. Add even more immersive experiences
Our tours are all about fully experiencing cultures through history, food, art, and beyond. If you’re looking to get even more of that, we have optional activities for you to add on. These excursions bring you even closer to the culture, immersing you in an activity, tour, or tasting. Walk the Path of the Gods to Positano on our Amalfi Coast Walking Tour, or learn to make traditional Peruvian food in Cuzco on our A Week in Peru: Lima, Cuzco & Machu Picchu tour. Whether it’s food and drink or nature and animals that make you feel more immersed in a culture, we have an excursion for you. “In Thailand, everybody had a blast—but the excursions that we got to do! We had one where we did this cave kayaking and you actually had to lay down in your kayak, which we weren’t quite prepared for—but it was the most amazing experience ever,” said Group Coordinator Lori.
As a travel leader stacking up Global Rewards points with every trip you organize, you’ll quickly have enough points to add excursions to tours. Try a Swahili cooking class on our Tanzania Wildlife Safari; you’ll be able to shop your way through a local market for ingredients before crafting a traditional meal and enjoying your creation with your group. Or, take to the water, like Lori, and tack on our Santorini caldera cruise and dinner on our Food & Wine: A Taste of Greece tour.
5. Enjoy a Convention Tour
Our Convention Tours are crafted exclusively for Group Coordinators from all over to come together in epic destinations around the globe (think: Bhutan, Egypt, and New Year’s Eve in Paris!). Group Coordinators tour these iconic locales, get a coveted sneak peek into Go Ahead’s newest projects, and meet Go Ahead staffers and other Group Coordinators. “Convention Tours are our favorite way to celebrate our Group Coordinators!” said staffer Nic after exploring Bhutan with Group Coordinators on a 2024 Convention Tour.
Many of our Group Coordinators save their points to book Convention Tours. “You can use your points for a lot of things—booking flights, booking other tours—but my favorite [way to spend them] is on Convention Tours,” Group Coordinator Davis said. “You get to network with Go Ahead staff and other Group Coordinators who might have more experience than you, might know other things, or might just be able to help you build your travel program. So I love the rewards that go along with leading the tours.” Using your points to go on a Convention Tour is about more than how to travel for free; it’s an experience jam-packed with local cuisine, tutorials to help fill your trips, guided tours, staff panels, and so much more.
Thea fell in love with travel as soon as she arrived in Venice, Italy on a family trip as a child. Since then, she has made having adventures around the world a priority, with trips like retracing her grandfather’s steps through WWII, climbing glaciers in Alaska, and horseback riding in Iceland. Thea is a nomad at heart, always planning the next trip. In her off-time she is working on a novel inspired by the woman she was named after, mixing cocktails, and watching any procedural crime show she can find.
