Adventure events company posts its biggest year of sales to date

A York-headquartered business providing global adventure challenges has forecast turnover of £4m and a £300,000 profit for 2021/22.

It is Rat Race’s most successful year of sales so far. Born out of founder Jim Mee’s passion for travel, the firm has hosted over 500 UK and international events in 20 countries since it began in 2004, with its number of international events set to double to 40 by the end of 2023.

Rat Race has grown from staging one event in Edinburgh at inception to operating 50 trips and adventures across the world during 2022.

Explaining how his concept for the business came into being, Mee said the enterprise began by taking adventure sports such as running, mountain biking, kayaking and abseiling out of the wild places and putting them on the streets of the city.

He added: “Fast forward to today and we have now expanded and pivoted our offering post COVID towards international and multi-day bucket list challenges – allowing us to make peoples’ sense of adventure and wanderlust a reality following those dark times during lockdown, when no-one could go anywhere or do anything.

“In general, we are trying where possible to deliver events with a sense of journey. That could be ‘A to B’ like a coast to coast journey, or have a tangible objective, such as the Race to the Wreck in Namibia.

“We are always seeking to innovate in the marketplace and never follow the crowd. No more-so is this true now of the new Bucket List, Test Pilot and other international formats we are operating. These are part expedition, part event, but totally unique and utterly Rat Race in the way we have formatted them.”

Among the adventures Rat Race is offering this year is a chance to journey across the Namib Desert in Namibia to reach a famous shipwreck, a Trans Andean coast-to-coast cycling adventure from the Pacific to the Atlantic, a 100–mile journey across a frozen lake in Outer Mongolia, a traverse of Dominica’s entire nature island, and a Panama coast-to-coast challenge.

The company’s group trips are spearheaded by head of expeditions Abbi Naylor, a trained explorer with more than 10 years of experience under her belt. 

When the pandemic put an end to her freelance life as a full-time expedition leader, she joined Rat Race. Naylor said: “Not only do I get to dream up extreme adventures to enjoy myself, but I also get to guide participants along with me.”