smarTours, a leading provider of value-oriented travel experiences to exotic global destinations, is pleased to announce that Philip Wolf has joined the Company’s Board of Directors. Summit Park, a private investment firm, led a recapitalization of smarTours in October 2017, and the additions to the Board of Directors and the management team are consistent with Summit Park’s strategy of investing in the leadership of the Company to position smarTours for growth and continued success.

Mr. Wolf joins smarTours with over 30 years of experience in the travel industry. In 1994, Mr. Wolf founded Phocuswright, Inc., an authority in travel industry research and conferences, where he served as CEO until the sale of the company in 2011 to Northstar Travel Media. In addition to the successful sale of Phocuswright, Mr. Wolf was involved in the sale of Newtrade to Expedia in 2002 and the sale of TravelJigsaw (now rentalcars.com) to Priceline in 2010 and its merger with Ibibo Group in 2017. Mr. Wolf serves as a board director on three continents, including eDreams ODIGEO in Spain and MakeMyTrip in India, as well as Hopper (U.S.), TrustYou (Germany), and Blacklane (Germany). He is also chairman of travel consultancy Hudson Crossing (U.S.), as well as a board advisor to dnata (UAE), DataArt (U.S./U.K), RedDoorz (Indonesia), and ITB China. Mr. Wolf formerly served as an adjunct professor at NYU’s Preston Robert Tisch Center for Hospitality, Tourism, and Sports Management and as a distinguished lecturer at the Cornell University School of Hotel Administration. Before founding Phocuswright, Mr. Wolf was President and CEO of a venture-funded software developer and travel booking engine pioneer. Mr. Wolf holds an MBA from Vanderbilt University’s Owen Graduate School of Management and a BA from Duke University.

“We are very excited to have Philip join the smarTours Board of Directors to support our collective vision for the future of the Company,” said Christine Petersen, President and Chief Executive Officer. “Philip has deep experience and relationships throughout the travel industry, and we expect that, as a result, he will make significant contributions to the Company’s growth strategy going forward.” Additionally, smarTours added Elyse Lindsey as Vice President of Marketing and Kendra Guild as Head of Product in the second and third quarters of 2019.

About smarTours
smarTours is a leading provider of direct-to-consumer, value-oriented travel experiences to exotic global destinations. The Company currently offers all-inclusive, curated tours to over 50 destinations, and over 225,000 passengers have traveled with smarTours since the founding in 1996. smarTours offers both packaged tours with set departure dates for individual travelers as well as customized private tours for 20+ person passenger groups. For more information, visit http://www.smartours.com.

About Summit Park
Summit Park is a Charlotte, North Carolina-based private investment firm focused on investments in businesses with between $20 - $200 million in revenue in the Eastern half of the United States. The firm invests across a range of industries, including business and consumer services, light manufacturing and value-added distribution. Capital can be used to facilitate a change in ownership, to support expansion and growth, to provide partial liquidity to existing owners, or to support an industry consolidation plan. For more information, visit http://www.summitparkllc.com/.