Business promotes travel diversity
A consultancy was created to help travel brands serve a more diverse group of travelers through its tourism marketing efforts and staff training.
Gainesville-based and female founder, Courtnie Nichols, launched Compass Collective in January to work with travel brands to authentically connect with Black travelers.
“The travel community has a diversity problem,” Nichols said. “There was something I can do in the space I’m in. I wanted to create a bridge for more diversity.”
Nichols’ love for travel led her to take her passion full-time.
Since her first solo flight at age 10, she has lived in Europe and explored the world.
Luxury travel advisor Courtnie Nichols is the founder of Compass Collective, TravelBash and TRVLB.
Luxury travel advisor Courtnie Nichols family has always been drawn to service. Her grandfather, Ernest McKinney, was the first Black alderman in the town of Jonesborough, Tenn., coincidentally elected the same day Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated at the other end of the state in 1968. Her father, Kevin McKinney, following in Ernest s footsteps, was the youngest and first Black mayor of Jonesborough.
Now, Nichols is following in their footsteps in her own fashion, hoping to serve the travel industry with a new diversity consultancy, Compass Collective. Compass Collective is the third travel business Nichols has founded; the Gainesville, Fla.-based advisor started the romance-focused agency TravelBash in 2017 and subsequently the membership-based agency TRVLB.