Xin Chao tours and the mission of helping Vietnamese people become local ambassadors

Vietnam - a small S-shaped country on the Indochinese peninsula - features extraordinary landscapes, foods, and cultures. There is more about the land than you can’t find and read on any massive media. The point is: tourists, especially foreign visitors find it hard to touch and feel the local vibe via common tours. Those tourist agencies just focus on touristy attractions, build up the same boring routes, and ignore the need of visitors. Plus, travelers have no idea about where they can find help in a strange place. He noticed this after he had chances to help several foreign friends.

The story dated back in 2005, in Saigon. That was when he worked at a local restaurant. He recalls: “I was working at Arab Kebab in downtown Saigon, where I began helping travelers learn Vietnamese and find their way around the city.  From there, I also had opportunities to help business people and expats with their issues navigating life in the city.” Three years later, he also had a great chance to work with Michigan University professors to evaluate the Charity project of Heifer International Organization in Vietnam.

As a young man full of passion and kindness, he aimed to build a company in order that all wonderful stories and local experiences of Vietnam can be shared with travelers, especially foreign visitors. Soon after that, he founded Xin Chao Tours to make his ambition come true in 2008. At that time, the original name of his company was Xin Chao Private Vietnam Tours and he worked on this project all by himself..

Along his journey, Bao Loc self-studied new things about Vietnam and traveled to more local regions with his customers. He found out every person has their own wide knowledge and inspired stories that are what travelers truly look for on their trips. While local experiences are valuable, people seem to not know about it as well as how to use English to convey to foreign visitors.

In addition, Vietnam is still a developing nation where the economy and living standard of people is not as good as Western countries. He understands English skills can give locals the key to the door of opportunity. If more people know the value of their local experiences and have the ability to communicate with foreign tourists, they can improve the quality of national tourism and get better income.

For all those reasons, he started to find, inspire, and help more locals become local ambassadors. Says Mr. Bao Loc: “Since then, I have had the fortune of working with an amazing team from South to North Vietnam. Together, we strive to constantly offer the best experiences of our city and country to our clients.” The story seemed to change drastically after he decided to start this new journey.

The Xin Chao Private Vietnam Tours team receives numerous bookings from foreign travelers. They carefully listen to all clients’ requests and desires to create customized tours that stay focused on local experiences, proper routes, saving time, money, and private trips. Especially, travelers can discuss and adjust their adventures as they desire without any hassles.  That means all customers coming to the team definitely have a wonderful locally-engaged vacation in Vietnam. 

After the first resounding success at Xin Chao Private Vietnam Tours, he developed Xin Chao Locals which consists of short tailored ready-made tours (from 2 to 8 hours). That is a perfect choice for FITs who don’t have a lot of time but still want to experience real Vietnam like a local. All they need is to connect the team, pick up a proper route, and be ready to go. Of course, clients can adjust the trip if they think it is needed.

At Xin Chao Tours, every member is Vietnamese who has love and pride for their country and travel. They are trained to become local ambassadors and then professional tour guides. After being through 9 steps of training, each person can improve English skills as well as know how to serve tourists the best services along with particular local values.

“The more locals become local ambassadors, the more successful we are.” - Mr. Bao Loc shares that he seriously wants to help as many locals as possible to spread out the value of their community, make more money and create a better future. There is no limit for those who want to join Xin Chao Tours from living place, gender, age to job. Beginning from Saigon, now the Xin Chao Tours team has members from numerous places in Vietnam such as Hanoi, Sapa, Hue, Danang, and Dongnai. To emphasize, the list does not end here and he has kept trying his best to connect, inspire, and help more Vietnamese people become local ambassadors.

More than a place to train people to become professional tour guides, the Xin Chao Tours team is like a family. There is a tight connection among members, which is made of passion, love, and kindness. Mr. Bao Loc always encourages them to be creative, stay connected, and together solve the problems. That is why all customized services from the company are both excellent and full of hospitality. All the efforts of the team give them a Certificate of Excellence on TripAdvisor. There are hundreds of 5-star excellent reviews from former clients on the platform as the best proof of how qualified they are.

Besides focusing on business, Mr. Bao Loc never forgets to run a charity program at every end of the year. All members of the team come to remote areas like Dalat and Bao Loc where people still struggle in life. They give young locals gifts, bicycles, and hope so that people have the motivation to keep going on. Moreover, the CEO also gives excellent local ambassadors a trip to a new place in Vietnam yearly. That is a meaningful reward for them to relax, learn more about amazing things, enhance the team’s connection, and improve tour-guiding skills.

Xin Chao Tours runs a meaningful mission for Vietnamese locals. They create a friendly and professional working environment for those who have a passion for travel and take pride in the value of their communities. Everyone can join the team, have a dream job with a high income, and improve their English skills. Plus, foreign tourists have a trusted place where they can find helpful support, set up tailored tours then ready for genuinely local experiences like a local.

T.T