Alumnus Adam Salzman launches one-stop-shop for student adventure, travel and work experience

Have you ever wondered what it might be like to work a destination job during a gap semester or a gap year? Figuring out the logistics of travel, transportation, housing, and other expenses seems far too much to weigh for things to balance. Many students have expressed an interest in finding an experience like this but have difficulty making it possible.

Enter Adam Salzman, an Ohio University graduate with the drive to make it happen. Adam founded AdventureEXP to give students “a unique chance… to explore your country, gain work experience and have fun in a structured & guided program where you can earn money to help offset the cost of your travel.”

AdventureEXP's programs take you to destinations such as a resort town in Idaho, Yellowstone National Park, Sun Valley, and the American Southwest. Students can work jobs in fields such as hospitality, food service, engineering, and more. One student (Emily) shared her experience in their Southwest Adventures program, “I gained experience working with management, speaking up for myself, and working with high-priority clientele. I was drawn to the location by the national monuments, museums, and cultural heritage sites that surround the area.” The student continued, “Ultimately, the most meaningful parts of my experience were the people I met and the adventures I went on.” These programs are engineered to cater to the wants and needs of each individual student, rather than grouping everyone into the same expectation.

Adam didn’t start off his career by immediately launching his business. After graduating from Ohio University with a degree in finance and international business, he thought that he wanted to work in finance for a multinational corporation. Reflecting, he said, “I quickly learned that’s not the impact I want to make in the world.” After this, he started working with an educational program focused on working with international students. Before COVID, he was bringing about 3,000 students from around 60 countries to the United States.

His experience here gave him the structure and the resources to independently run a small business. It was something of a training ground for when he realized and recognized his want to bring American students to work and study in other areas of the world.

As he went through the process of bringing up this business, he came to be affiliated with the National Gap Year Association. “Being able to find already-established individuals, organizations, and associations to tap into and … catapult using their credibility was a really important piece to growth and also to validate this concept that you’re bringing out into the world.” AdventureEXP is one of the first to focus on helping students work to offset the cost of travel and experience — uniting with a more well-known association garnered him support and trust that he may not have otherwise had.

This may have been an uphill battle especially because AdventureEXP doesn’t focus on just one area of the country. He thought about meaningful experiences from the perspective of a college student from two main standpoints: realism and structured experiences. The first was realism: finding housing and transportation for an affordable price, as well as connecting students to employers. The second was the need to create a structured experience that still allowed for flexibility so that students could create meaning for themselves in the process and decide how they want to shape it for themselves.

Adam chose to organize his knowledge and necessities throughout the process of launching, running, and growing his business into three categories: known knowns, known unknowns, and unknown unknowns.

Known knowns are the bits of information that Adam is aware of. He knows that students can work to offset the cost of travel, for example. Known unknowns are the bits of information that Adam knows he doesn’t know - he doesn’t know exactly which students he will serve, which is why his business appeals to such a large demographic. The third and most complicated category is the unknown unknowns, the things he doesn’t know he’s unaware of.

“My methodology of working through those, dealing with their very nature, is I lean on my network. People out there in the world have tried similar things, and I’ve articulated questions to ask them, like, ‘What has surprised you the most about launching a project in China?’ That uncovers unknowns that maybe I hadn’t thought about.” This way of thinking brings to the forefront the necessity of having a support network of people with similar experiences.

Talking to people with other experiences, perspectives, and motivations helps to shape one’s own experiences, perspectives, and motivations. “The business that I launched looks very different from the business I’m running today, and I suspect my business will look very different in six months.” The support from his network has allowed AdventureEXP to grow and change using valuable ideas from others. A few tentative plans for future expansion include Park City, Utah and Flagstaff, Arizona.

At the same time, Adam is looking to take his business to the international level. In 2022, AdventureEXP is launching three international programs: an internship in the Galapagos in Ecuador, a work exchange program in the Sacred Valley in Peru, and an anthropology-archaeology internship in central China. “This aligns with my core values in that I believe in the power of meaningful travel. I wanted to start domestically because I believe in democratizing travel and making it affordable … and I’m imprinting that on international experience as well.” No matter where students decide to go, Adam prioritizes working to offset the cost of travel and creating meaningful experiences at the core of each opportunity.

For more information about Adam and his business, you can visit the AdventureEXP website at www.adventureexp.com.