Global outbreak of COVID-19 disease has affected several industries around the world, including the tourism sector. When it comes to an expert city such as Berlin that has an extensive and complex history and diverse culture, the visiting pattern involving walking tours have always been engaging among the public as well as the tourists. Nevertheless, due to the presence of the viral disease and providing measures of distanced social interaction, the functioning of walking tours has been impacted. In the following blog post, we will discuss how COVID-19 has affected Berlin’s walking tours and how the companies have since adjusted.

1. Discontinuation of Walking Tours when Transferring to Lockdown

With the staking of positive cases, Berlin like other cities all over the world was forced to close to contain the spread of the virus. At this time, all other businesses were shut down, including those offering services in walking tours. This meant a total elimination of the walking tour services that hugely affected the commission that tour operators and tour guides receive.

2. Tenacity and promising safety measures

When restrictions were being lifted slowly, walking tours also began operating but in a new form that keeps the participants and the tour guides safe. Tour operators have implemented a range of safety measures, including:

Wearing of masks for both the persons participating in the tour and the tourist guides

Decreased the number or size of fellow travellers in the organized trips to enable compliance with physical distancing.

Temperature check before the beginning of the tour

Offering of hand tincture and gloves

Regular sanitation of apparatus and irregularities that people come across usually touch.

Through putting such measures, tour operators want tourists to enjoy their trip with the least chance of contacting the virus.

3. Shift to Virtual Tours

Understanding the current challenges associated with live guided tours, most of the tour operators in Berlin have developed virtual tours. These tours employ video-conferencing facilities through which such participants shall be offered a guided tour experience from their homes. Virtual tours can be taken from the comfort of one’s home while undertaking a Berliner virtual tour, one is able to see famous sites and learn about its history.

4. Tourist Visits to Lesser Traveled Areas

Due to the limitations of travels, tourists visiting Berlin have also declined, and they have allowed operators to consider the places that have not been frequent by tourists before. While earlier walking tours centered on major attraction sites, the present-day one offers a chance to participants to visit the less known places or neighborhoods of Berlin.

5. Online Reservation and No Touch Payments

To avoid close contact with clients, and to reduce chances of passing on the virus several tour operators have embraced online sales and cashless transactions. People can book the walking tours in advance, many websites are available for that purpose; during the check-in process, participants can manage to avoid coming into contact. When tours operators opt for accepting credit cards or mobile payments for instance, they avoid the direct use of cash and physical touching.

6. Resilience and Adaptability

While the Covid-19 pandemic has presented significant threats to the walking tour industry in Berlin some crucial observations have been made. The findings also underscore tour operators’ capacity as a segment to continue to adapt to safety measures as a sales strategy while enriching and informing participants.

In conclusion:

Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, many walking tours in Berlin are only possible with interruptions, with infection protection measures or as virtual tours. While transitioning to the new normal, the tour operators will keep on integrating this trend such that participants boarding the tour vans can enjoy the tour and sightseeing over the beauty of Berlin without necessarily contracting the virus.