About The Journey

We specialise in tourism destination management, planning and marketing.  We assist tourism destinations in making most of their potential by drawing on our experience,  knowledge and creativity. Since 2005 The Journey has conducted close on 90 assigments in more than 25 destinations, both as sole provider and in association with our partners.  Our clients include major international agencies (UNWTO, UNDP, World Bank, USAID, etc.), regional tourism organizations,  national Tourism Ministries, local municipalities, private operators, etc.

The Journey offers high level, personalised service delivered by experienced and senior tourism professionals.  We are accessible to our clients at all times and pride ourselves in the quality of our work.

Dr Mike Fabricius

Dr Mike Fabricius Photo

Mike Fabricius is an experienced strategist, manager, marketer and entrepreneur who played a leadership role in the successful development of the South African tourism industry and has been consulting at an international level since 2004. After occupying various senior management positions in South Africa's tourism industry he established The Journey, an independent international tourism advisory and consultancy practice.  Mike regularly participates as advisor and expert in various assignments for the United Nations World Tourism Organization (UNWTO) andThe Journey has managed and executed tourism planning projects for a range of clients in 25 countries in Africa, the Middle East, Asia, Europe and various provinces and regions of South Africa. Mike regularly presents courses on tourism destination management for tourism professionals worldwide.  He is an Editorial Board member of the international Journal of Sustainable Tourism and his profile is included in the Who's Who in Southern Africa.

Dr Fabricius holds a PhD (Nelson Mandela University) and an MBA (cum laude) (UNISA). In 2002 he was awarded the University of South Africa Council Medal for the best student over 4 years of the Master of Business Leadership. His thesis was entitled "Competitive Strategies for Tourism Destinations".

Associate Companies

Trout and Partners Positioning Strategists Photo

Trout and Partners Positioning Strategists

The Journey is a partner of Trout and Partners the consulting firm founded by Jack Trout, who is recognized as the world's foremost marketing strategist. He is responsible for the freshest ideas in marketing in the last twenty years and his concept of Positioning has become the world's #1 business strategy. Together with other talented consultants, Mr. Trout has created an international network of consultant boutiques which offer preeminent skills and hands-on experience in the implementation of Positioning strategies.

GAPP Architects and Urban Designers Photo

GAPP Architects and Urban Designers

GAPP Architects and Urban Designers has evolved to become one of Southern Africa's foremost professional firms, with an award-winning portfolio of work in high profile and prestigious projects such as: The Apartheid Museum, The Arabella Sheraton Grand Hotel, The Western Cape Hotel and Spa, The Park Hyatt, Maropeng at The Cradle of Humankind, Freedom Park, The V&A Waterfront and Nelson Mandela Square to name just a few. The Journey and GAPP have worked together extensively on projects in the Middle East and Africa.

TEAM Tourism Consulting Photo

TEAM Tourism Consulting

The Journey frequently cooperates with TEAM Tourism, a UK based tourism consulting group and Mike Fabricius is a senior associate of TEAM.  TEAM has worked for tourism destinations across all aspects of destination development, management, conservation and marketing.  With 40+ associate consultants, TEAM has undertaken more than 250 projects over the past thirteen years and has been active in twenty countries, across six continents. 

WSP Engineering Photo

WSP Engineering

WSP Group is one of the world’s fastest-growing engineering and management consultancies specialising in property, transport and environmental projects. The Journey works closely with WSP Africa, a subsidiary of WSP Group plc.  It is head quartered in Johannesburg, South Africa and employees has over 800 employees spread amongst is offices throughout South Africa. In addition, WSP has offices in Mauritius, Seychelles, Tanzania, Kenya and Nigeria.WSP Africa offers unrivalled engineering skills and expertise with the added benefit of experience throughout the African continent

Urban Econ Development Economists Photo

Urban Econ Development Economists

URBAN-ECON is a professional consultancy firm specialising in the field of development economics. Development economics as advocated by URBAN-ECON refers to the field of research where holistic development principles are applied in an economic context. The approach that URBAN-ECON follows is based on the integration of the various components of development economics, namely economic market focus, spatial aspects, sustainable planning and strategic development facilitation. The underlying principle is that tourism is an important element in any holistic development process.

Associate Specialists

Johnny Johnson (Brand Strategy and Communication) Photo

Johnny Johnson (Brand Strategy and Communication)

Johnny Johnson has close on thirty years  experience working on brands and communications. He is a graduate of Stellenbosch University with a commercial bachelors and an honours in business administration. He has been client service director at Ogilvy’s, managing director and Young & Rubicam and Saatchi & Saatchi, chairman of specialist agencies at TBWA, and head of strategy at Switch.  He founded and ran his own specialist brand and communications strategy agency, Burns, for ten years, until it was merged with Switch Branding & Design.  He is currently an independent branding and marketing specialist.

Peter Fabricius (eTourism) Photo

Peter Fabricius (eTourism)

Peter is a designer and Travel 2.0 enthusiast, primarily involved in eTourism planning and website development at The Journey. While completing his degree in Tourism Management he conducted research on 'The eMarketing ability of tourism SMME's".  This sparked his interest in the power of the Internet for the tourism industry, a topic he has been facinated with since. He  has worked with online travel companies and fulfiled diverse roles from screening and recruiting operators for online travel portals, to being fulltime web designer and content editor for an online booking portal.  Peter is passionate about the ongoing change the web has brought to tourism and loves designing beautiful websites and staying up to date with the latest online travel trends and technologies.