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Residents of the Western Tidewater region will soon have a new means of affordable, easy and safe travel for sightseeing, city and college tours, school field trips, concert trips, transportation to religious or sporting events, and more.

Dr. Eric Majette and Raymond Everett are bringing a new charter bus service to Franklin called Vision Tours.

THE SERVICES OF VISION TOURS

They summed up the services they are looking for the company to provide.

“We want to make sure that we’re providing transportation for hire to organizations, whether they’re in the private sector or the public sector,” Everett said. “We want to make sure they have the opportunity to take trips, whether we’re talking about to colleges, casinos, wineries, sporting events. We want to make sure, again, that we’re providing a value-added service to the local community.”

“At affordable prices for the whole region,” Majette added.

Marketing material for Vision Tours notes that the service will facilitate a wide variety of journeys in addition to those aforementioned, including brewery tours, international tours, shopping trips, theater trips, wedding group travel and customized trips and tours.

Everett said his wife, Dr. Stacey Everett, plays an integral part in developing and coordinating some of the trips.

WHY THE COMPANY IS BASED IN FRANKLIN 

Majette said the decision was made to base Vision Tours in Franklin because he and Everett identified a specific need there.

“We felt like it was a great opportunity,” Majette said. “With the growth in the community, it would fill a gap in that community to have a charter bus service coming out of Franklin where they don’t have to go to Norfolk or Chesapeake or Emporia to get those types of services.”

Everett said, “We definitely want to service the community and provide opportunities that would be cost-efficient and enable them to enjoy trips throughout the state.”

The Vision Tours office in Franklin is located inside the Franklin Business Center, which is coordinated by Franklin Southampton Economic Development Inc.

FSEDI President and CEO Karl T. Heck said, “Vision Tours LLC not only has allowed the Franklin Business Center to reach 100% occupancy for the second time in its history, the company has the potential to expand our tourism industry through the creation of a new charter bus service marketing affordable, easy, fun and safe travel. Having this kind of company based in Franklin should help connect tourism providers to the area and hopefully help grow our tourism opportunities.”

BUSINESS CAPACITY

Majette said Vision Tours currently has one bus, but it has access to additional buses if a client requires it. He noted that Vision Tours is partnered with other charter companies to enable access to more buses, but he also indicated that Vision Tours will be expanding its own fleet in the future.

WHEN VISION TOURS WILL BE OPEN FOR BUSINESS

Estimating when Vision Tours will be operational, Majette said, “I would say by Jan. 1, we should be up and running.”

He noted that the company’s bus was over in Hampton as of Tuesday, Dec. 6, being painted and having company logos applied to it.