The University of Florida Tourism Crisis Management Institute and the Innovation Analysis Group launched TravelCrisis.com, a website designed to provide consumers with timely advice in the midst of crises at major sports, music or tourism events around the globe.
Addison Schonland, president of IAG, says the just-introduced website aggregates content about the World Cup or Olympics, and combines that with expertise from the University of Florida and social media feeds to help participants going to major events plan their outings or cope with unexpected happenings.
TravelCrisis takes Twitter feeds with the hashtag #travelcrisis and posts them to the right side of the homepage.
Schonland says consumers can post tips, videos and photos to add real-time content as major events and situations, such as the post-Iranian election rebellion, are unfolding.
Both IAG and the university's Tourism Crisis Management Institute plan to provide this service and make some money off the venture, and they are seeking corporate sponsors from destination marketing organizations and event organizers.
Lori Pennington, the director of the institute, says it conducts research for DMOs on crisis-management plans and hopes to provide to consumers "a timely and accurate information flow" in response to crises ranging from soccer riots to terrorist acts and petty crimes.
TravelCrisis.com's tagline is "Tracking Disruptive Travel Activities Worldwide."
Another company, iJet Intelligent Risk Systems, formerly marketed to travel agents as iJet Travel Intelligence, might be considered to be in the same arena. iJet provides risk-oriented and intelligence information about countries and events around the world, but unlike TravelCrisis.com, iJet's target audience primarily is corporations, not consumers.