Tour Operator Revenue Benchmark

Average Tour Operator Revenue per Year 2022 Economic Census

The 2022 Economic Census counts every tour operator with paid employees and publishes their combined annual receipts, which include the hotels, transport and activities bundled into the tours sold. Dividing that total by the number of operators gives the average annual revenue per employer establishment shown below.

≈$3,259,000 /year

Average annual gross revenue per employer establishment

How this is calculated: about $9 billion in combined annual receipts divided by 2,771 employer establishments works out to an average annual revenue of $3,259,000 per employer establishment.

Scope: Tour Operators, NAICS 561520. The category covers tour operators that arrange and assemble tours sold directly or through travel agents. Travel agencies selling others' products and sightseeing transportation companies running vehicles are counted in separate categories. Classified separately in group 5615: 561510 Travel Agencies; 561591 Convention and Visitors Bureaus; 561599 All Other Travel Arrangement and Reservation Services. Nothing outside that code is counted on this page.

Source US Census Bureau, 2022 Economic Census, Summary Statistics (ECNBASIC): ESTAB, RCPTOT and PAYANN by NAICS · Vintage 2022 Economic Census · Calculation BusinessNES · Accessed September 2026

Employer Establishments at Year Five Endpoint only

Travel Arrangement and Reservation Services, NAICS 5615, the 2018 starting count compared with the count of five-year-old establishments in 2023.

Across the 2014 to 2018 cohorts, five-year results ranged from 16.0 to 48.1 percent. This benchmark covers Travel Arrangement and Reservation Services, NAICS 5615, as a whole, and this category accounts for 2,771 of the 15,966 employer establishments in it. A count by age is not a survival rate, because the figures compare two headcounts rather than follow one set of businesses.

Payroll as a Share of Revenue Official data

Payroll divided by receipts, both as published for the same year.

Payroll share of receipts, Tour Operators, United States, 2022 Economic Census.

Approximately 17.0 percent of every revenue dollar goes to annual payroll, a small share because most of a tour's price pays hotels, transport and activity providers, while a modest team designs, sells and coordinates the trips.

Payroll here excludes benefits, employer taxes and owner compensation, and it excludes payments to hotels, airlines, coach companies, guides and local operators, which together carry most of what a tour operator collects.

Business Scale and Ownership Structure Official data

How large the average establishment is, and whether the population is independent operators or multi-site companies.

Scale and ownership, Tour Operators, United States, 2022 Economic Census.

The average establishment employed about 10.2 people, and the industry averaged 1.1 employer establishments per firm, which confirms that multi-establishment ownership exists in the published population without showing how establishments are distributed across firms. As an illustration, that headcount could be product, sales and operations staff, with guides hired per trip.

These are arithmetic industry averages. They state the size of the average establishment and show that multi-establishment ownership exists. They do not show the distribution of business sizes and they do not measure market concentration.

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Data Source Notice

This product uses the Census Bureau Data API but is not endorsed or certified by the Census Bureau.

Figures above are from the 2022 Economic Census reference year, released by the Census Bureau in 2024 and 2025; markets have moved since.

Questions Worth Asking BusinessNES analysis

Tour Operator: what supplier costs, seasons and unsold seats do to a packaged-travel average.

Before you rely on this benchmark

• How much of the price passes through? Hotels, flights, coaches and activities bought for each tour flow through receipts, so revenue overstates what an operator earns for designing and running trips. The operator's margin sits inside a much larger invoice.
• Who carries the risk of empty seats? Operators commit to rooms and coaches ahead of sales, and a tour that departs half full still pays for the block. Load factor per departure is the central number of the trade and does not appear in receipts.
• Direct sales or through agents? Selling directly keeps the full margin but needs marketing, while travel agents bring bookings for a commission. The channel mix shapes both revenue and cost, and neither is published.
• How seasonal is the product? Ski trips, summer coach tours and winter sun packages each sell in their season, and deposits arrive months before travel. Cash flow and revenue follow a calendar an annual figure cannot show.
• Which currencies and contracts apply? International operators pay suppliers in foreign currencies and price tours months ahead, so exchange rate moves can erase a margin. Currency and contract terms are part of the risk outside a revenue total.
• What protects the customer's money? Deposits and prepayments are regulated in some states and by trade bodies through bonding or trust requirements, and an operator's failure can strand travelers. Compliance and financial protection are costs the benchmark does not show.