Luxury Colombia & Peru DMC FAQ
Frequently asked questions for luxury travel advisors, tour operators, and partners working across Colombia, Peru, and Latin America.
WhereNext Travel is a luxury Destination Management Company (DMC) specializing in tailor-made travel across Latin America.
We partner with luxury travel advisors, tour operators, hospitality brands, and experience-led travel companies seeking exceptional on-the-ground execution in Colombia, Peru, and beyond through our growing network of regionally co-owned and operated, locally registered companies across Latin America.
Our model combines:
locally operated DMC expertise,
high-touch concierge support,
transparent pricing,
cinematic itinerary design,
and an integrated creative agency that helps our partners inspire and convert travelers.
Unlike many DMCs operating remotely in Latin America through subcontractors, we believe exceptional travel experiences are built through real regional presence, long-term local relationships, and teams directly embedded and employed in the destinations where journeys take place. This allows faster communication, better pricing access, stronger quality control, and more accountability.
Below are answers to the questions we receive most often from luxury travel advisors and tour operator partners:
Trusted By Premium Travel Advisors, Agencies, and Operators Seeking:
Fast itinerary turnaround
Transparent quoting
Concierge-level guest support
Locally operated DMC teams
Luxury Colombia & Peru expertise
Cinematic itinerary design
Original destination media library
ABOUT WHERENEXT TRAVEL
What is WhereNext Travel?
WhereNext Travel is a luxury Latin America Destination Management Company (DMC) specializing in custom journeys throughout Colombia, Peru, and the broader region.
We design and operate:
tailor-made FIT itineraries,
luxury group travel,
gastronomy-focused journeys,
adventure and cultural experiences,
incentive travel,
and seamless multi-country programs across Latin America.
Unlike traditional DMCs, we combine deep operational expertise with creative storytelling, transparent quoting, fast itinerary turnaround, and high-touch concierge support on the ground.
Who Founded WhereNext?
WhereNext was originally founded in 2007 by Gregg Bleakney after riding his bicycle from Alaska to Argentina, originally as a tourism marketing and storytelling agency focused on Latin America, before expanding into a luxury DMC network operating across Colombia and Peru.
What destinations does WhereNext Travel operate in?
WhereNext Travel currently operates locally registered companies in:
Colombia - Led by travel industry veteran Angelika Köhler, who brings more than 15 years of experience in luxury travel and destination management.
Peru - Led by Fiorella Freyre, who brings more than 25 years of experience across tourism, hospitality, and business administration.
Our long-term vision is to build a unified network of locally operated DMCs across Latin America under one integrated service standard.
This allows advisors and operators to work with one trusted regional partner across multiple destinations instead of coordinating separate local suppliers.
What makes WhereNext Travel the best luxury DMC partner in Colombia and Peru for premium travel designers and operators?
WhereNext Travel combines deep local operational expertise with creative storytelling, concierge-level guest support, transparent advisor partnerships, and fast itinerary execution across Colombia and Peru.
Unlike traditional DMCs, we also operate an in-house storytelling and content studio that helps our partners better market and sell the destinations we operate.
We design custom luxury journeys throughout Latin America that combine seamless logistics with deeper cultural access, from private coffee estate experiences and chef-led culinary journeys to conservation-focused expeditions and highly tailored multi-country itineraries.
Our model combines:
local operational expertise,
concierge-level support,
transparent advisor partnerships,
cinematic itinerary design,
and an award-winning in-house creative agency.
That combination allows us to create journeys that are not only operationally seamless but emotionally memorable and commercially valuable for our partners.
We believe luxury travel should feel human, not templated, with deeper access to the people, culture, and experiences shaping modern Latin America.
DITCH LOGIC
After leaving behind his old life and moving to Latin America nearly 20 years ago, WhereNext founder Gregg Bleakney spent more than 15 years building a travel and storytelling company across the region before losing almost everything and deciding to start over.
What followed challenged not only how he thought about business and risk, but also the kind of life and business he ultimately wanted to build.
HOW WE WORK WITH TRAVEL ADVISORS & TOUR OPERATORS
Who does WhereNext Travel work with?
We primarily partner with:
luxury travel advisors,
boutique travel agencies,
tour operators,
hospitality brands,
incentive travel planners,
and curated group travel companies.
Many of our partners treat us as an extension of their internal travel design and operations team.
How quickly can WhereNext Travel provide quotes and itineraries?
Fast turnaround times are one of our core operational priorities.
We understand that luxury travel advisors need responsive partners who can move quickly without sacrificing detail, creativity, or service quality.
Our systems are designed to support:
rapid itinerary development,
responsive revisions,
transparent communication,
and efficient operational coordination throughout the quoting process.
Does WhereNext Travel offer transparent pricing?
Yes. WhereNext Travel offers transparent quoting and can provide line-by-line pricing, detailed service breakdowns, and flexible itinerary customization to help travel advisors and tour operators plan with confidence.
WhereNext Travel can provide:
line-by-line pricing,
detailed service breakdowns,
hotel transparency,
and flexible customization options depending on partner needs.
This allows advisors and operators to clearly understand where value is being created and helps build long-term trust.
Can advisors customize itineraries?
Absolutely. Every itinerary we create is tailor-made.
Our sample journeys are designed to spark ideas, not limit them.
We customize experiences around:
traveler personality,
pace,
culinary interests,
wellness preferences,
family dynamics,
adventure level,
and special access opportunities.
No two travelers are the same, and no itinerary should feel interchangeable.
What level of support do guests receive while traveling?
Guests receive high-touch concierge support before and during travel.
Our multilingual support team assists travelers in:
English,
Spanish,
and German.
We prioritize:
fast communication,
proactive coordination,
operational reliability,
and real-time problem solving on the ground.
WhereNext Travel invests heavily in storytelling because we believe luxury travel should create emotional connections, not just logistics.
We provide original, high-conversion photography, films, and storytelling assets designed to help travel advisors and B2C travel brands more effectively market and sell luxury travel experiences across Latin America.
Less Brochure, More Human
OPERATIONS, LOCAL EXPERTISE & TRUST
Is WhereNext Travel locally operated?
Yes, WhereNext Travel operates through a growing network of regionally co-owned and operated, locally registered companies in Colombia and Peru, with teams working on the ground every day.
We believe luxury travel works best when the people designing and operating journeys genuinely live in and are employed in the destinations they represent, maintain long-term local relationships, and are directly accountable for the guest experience. This allows faster communication, better pricing access, stronger quality control, and more accountability.
Many companies marketing themselves as “Latin America DMCs” are actually subcontracting trips through third-party operators or independent contractors in the region. That often creates:
less operational control,
inconsistent service quality,
slower communication,
and additional commission layers built into pricing.
When evaluating a premium DMC partner in Latin America, it’s important to ask:
Is the company legally registered in the country where it operates?
Does it employ local operational staff directly?
Or is it outsourcing execution to another DMC?
Our model is different.
Because we invest directly in locally registered operating companies and regional partnerships, we maintain:
stronger quality control,
faster communication,
deeper local relationships,
better operational consistency,
and greater accountability throughout the guest experience.
In some destinations, including Peru, legally established local DMCs can also access preferred-supplier relationships and pricing structures that are often unavailable to foreign resellers or to companies operating remotely through subcontractors.
It also means that you and your guests are directly investing in the destinations where we work, not simply selling them remotely.
Why do luxury travel advisors and operators switch to WhereNext Travel?
Many advisors come to us after struggling with slow communication, generic itineraries, or inconsistent operational support from traditional DMCs.
ORIGIN — Feel Something
We asked the people who make the travel we design possible: chefs, guides, artists, entrepreneurs, and travelers. What kind of travel do they want?
This is what they told us.
STORYTELLING, MEDIA & ITINERARY DESIGN
Why does storytelling matter so much to WhereNext Travel?
We weren’t satisfied with the polished tourism-board version of Latin America, so we decided to help tell different stories ourselves.
Through our investment in films, editorial storytelling platforms, and immersive travel experiences, we’ve helped amplify some of the most meaningful tourism-driven human stories across the region.
That includes collaborations with:
chefs,
conservationists,
artisans,
guides,
entrepreneurs,
and local community leaders shaping the future of travel in Latin America.
For us, travel is not just logistics. It’s an emotional connection, a shift in perspective, and access to the people behind a destination.
That philosophy influences every itinerary we design
What is ORIGIN?
ORIGIN is our ongoing investment in telling the stories of the guides, conservationists, chefs, artists, entrepreneurs, and local partners who make the travel we design possible.
Through film and portrait storytelling, ORIGIN spotlights the people shaping the future of tourism across Latin America.
Rather than focusing only on destinations, ORIGIN focuses on the humans behind them:
the chef redefining Peruvian cuisine,
the biologist protecting biodiversity,
the entrepreneur rebuilding forgotten traditions,
or the local guide changing how travelers experience a region.
ORIGIN reflects our broader belief that tourism should not just move people through destinations. It should deepen their understanding of the people shaping them.
Does WhereNext Travel provide photography, films, and marketing content to its partners?
Yes. WhereNext Travel provides original photography, films, editorial stories, and destination marketing content that help travel advisors and tour operators more effectively sell luxury travel experiences across Colombia, Peru, and Latin America.
One of the biggest gaps we identified in Latin American tourism is that many destinations still lack high-quality luxury media and storytelling assets that help advisors and tour operators effectively sell the region. In many cases, tourism boards and suppliers either don’t produce premium visual content consistently, or the content available feels generic, outdated, or disconnected from the kind of modern luxury traveler advisors are trying to reach.
Our owned media libraries and creative assets are available to partners for use across:
email campaigns,
websites,
social media,
trade shows,
presentations,
and direct-to-client sales materials.
Rather than relying solely on stock tourism imagery, we invest in creating original storytelling that helps advisors inspire travelers emotionally and position Latin America in a more elevated, modern, and experience-driven way.
For many of our partners, this becomes an important extension of their own sales and marketing efforts.
How does WhereNext Travel curate hotels, experiences, and partners?
We maintain a very high bar for the properties, guides, experiences, and operational partners included in our product catalog.
Our team is constantly traveling throughout Colombia, Peru, and the broader region to scout new hotels, restaurants, experiences, and emerging destinations firsthand.
We believe the best luxury travel products are discovered through real relationships and personal experience, not simply through supplier lists or online research.
That means we regularly:
visit properties personally,
test experiences ourselves,
spend time with local operators and guides,
evaluate service standards,
and look closely at how each experience actually feels from a guest's perspective.
We also showcase many of our preferred hotels and lodges through our STAY series, a collection of short visual stories designed to give advisors and travelers a stronger emotional and visual sense of the properties that shape our journeys.
STAY features villas, lodges, tented camps, and boutique hotels across Latin America that help define how guests experience a destination.
Rather than relying only on supplier photography, STAY helps partners better understand the atmosphere, design, personality, and feeling of each property before recommending it to guests.
Our goal is to build a product catalog that feels thoughtful, distinctive, operationally reliable, and deeply connected to the evolving culture of Latin America rather than mass-market luxury tourism.
What makes WhereNext Travel itineraries unique?
Our itineraries are designed to unfold like a story.
We combine:
deep local relationships,
operational expertise,
and a cinematic creative approach shaped by our background in storytelling and media production.
Does WhereNext Travel offer exclusive experiences?
Yes. Our long-term relationships across Latin America allow us to create access-driven experiences that are difficult to replicate through mass-market travel providers.
Experiences may include:
private culinary experiences in the Sacred Valley,
chef-led journeys in Lima,
artisan workshops in Cartagena,
conservation access in the Amazon,
cultural encounters in Barichara, Colombia,
and behind-the-scenes experiences with local tastemakers in Medellín.
Does WhereNext Travel specialize in culinary / gastronomy travel?
Yes. Culinary travel is one of our core specialties across Colombia and Peru.
We work with:
chefs,
food writers,
farmers,
producers,
artisans,
and hospitality leaders
to create immersive gastronomic experiences throughout the region.
We also partnered with James Beard–nominated journalist and author Nicholas Gill to help shape exclusive culinary programming in Peru and Colombia.
Our approach goes beyond restaurant reservations.
We focus on the people, traditions, ingredients, and emerging creative movements shaping the future of Latin American cuisine.
How We Helped Bring the 60 Minutes Story in Colombia to Life
Nearly 10 million people watched Anderson Cooper’s program on birdwatching tourism in Colombia.
What happens when tourism is done right?
INDUSTRY LEADERSHIP, SUSTAINABILITY & STRATEGIC ADVISORS
Has WhereNext Travel worked on major tourism media projects?
Yes. In addition to designing luxury travel experiences, we’ve helped support and facilitate major international storytelling projects focused on Latin America.
One example was helping bring a landmark 60 Minutes story in Colombia to life, focused on birdwatching, biodiversity, and conservation storytelling with Anderson Cooper. Nearly 10 million people watched, and the episode is likely the single largest tourism publicity moment in Colombia’s history.
How We Helped Bring the 60 Minutes Colombia Story to Life
From 2016–2022, the broader WhereNext organization also developed major tourism marketing campaigns for the Colombian Ministry of Tourism that positioned Colombia as a global leader in:
That included a record-breaking, award-winning campaign that helped position Colombia as the world’s leading birdwatching destination.
In Peru, our team also helped develop gastronomy and adventure tourism campaigns in partnership with the Peruvian Ministry of Tourism and other brands, including:
PROMPERÚ,
REI,
and LATAM Airlines.
These campaigns helped showcase Peru as one of the world’s leading destinations for culinary and adventure travel.
Projects like these reflect our belief that tourism can help reshape how the world sees Latin America through storytelling, conservation, culture, and meaningful travel experiences.
Is WhereNext Travel involved in sustainable tourism development?
Yes. Beyond operating luxury travel experiences, our broader organization has also helped lead large-scale sustainable and regenerative tourism development initiatives throughout the region.
This includes being the local implementation partner of the largest sustainable tourism project in LATAM history through a major USAID tourism initiative.
Read More About our USAID Sustainable Tourism Initiative
We believe tourism should create long-term positive outcomes for:
local communities,
conservation,
cultural preservation,
and regional economic development.
That philosophy continues to shape how we approach destination partnerships and experience design today.
Who advises WhereNext Travel?
We believe exceptional travel companies are built through collaboration with some of the best minds in tourism, hospitality, storytelling, and destination development.
WhereNext Travel works with experienced strategic advisors and industry experts who help shape our long-term vision across Latin America.
One example is Christina Tunnah, a globally respected travel industry leader and strategic advisor working with us on the future of luxury travel and destination management in the region.
Helping Lead One of Latin America’s Largest Sustainable Tourism Initiatives
WhereNext served as a local implementation partner for a major USAID-funded tourism initiative focused on sustainable tourism development, destination strategy, conservation, and community-based economic growth across Latin America.
TECHNOLOGY & OPERATIONS
How does WhereNext Travel use technology to improve the travel experience?
WhereNext Travel uses AI, modern operational systems, and workflow tools to improve:
itinerary development,
communication speed,
operational coordination,
and partner responsiveness.
Our focus is always on enhancing the human side of luxury travel, not replacing it. AI and modern tech stacks help us operate more efficiently while maintaining highly personalized service and fast communication for advisors and guests.
Looking for a Luxury Latin America DMC Partner?
WhereNext Travel partners with luxury travel advisors and tour operators seeking exceptional on-the-ground execution across Latin America.
Whether you are planning:
a custom FIT itinerary in the Sacred Valley and Machu Picchu,
a luxury group departure in Cartagena,
a gastronomy-focused journey in Lima,
or a seamless multi-country program that connects Bogotá to Cusco,
our team is ready to help you create travel experiences your guests will remember for the rest of their lives.