Our Mission
Anacortes Kayak Tours is recognized to be the most progressive tour company in the sea kayaking industry of Washington State. Our commitment to the professional development of our staff increases the comfort and safety of our guests. We offer great value for our customers by providing well-maintained equipment, attentive customer service, as well as a fanatical attention to detail and consistency on our tours. With the health and well-being of the San Juan Islands ecology as our first priority, we promote a fun and educational experience for each of our guests on all of our trips.
Our Core Values
Honesty and Integrity
We strive to use marketing language that represents a true picture of what our customers may reasonably expect to experience when they patronize our business. Instead of utilizing overstatements or calculated omissions to make a sale, we are growing our business by developing a reputation for creating realistic expectations with our customers.
Environmental and Social Responsibility
As a company that depends on a healthy environment to be successful, we put environmental stewardship at the top of our priority list. All of our operations are conducted in a way that reduces our impact. Wildlife viewing is done in an ethical fashion, and every place that we visit is left cleaner than we found it. Additionally, we volunteer hundreds of hours per year to direct action stewardship in the San Juans, cleaning up beaches, maintaining trails, and servicing camp areas.
As parents to two young boys we believe that a strong community is imperative to maintaining a healthy living environment. To help facilitate that we volunteer many hours of service within our own community, as well as donating hundreds of trips and sizable monetary contributions to various local organizations that do important work in San Juan and Skagit counties. Our customers enjoy meals filled with locally grown, organic ingredients, and wherever possible we patronize local businesses to meet our business needs.
Redefining the Standard for Safety and Leadership Training Among Kayak Guides
We believe that having kayak guides with solid paddling skills, well developed systems for Risk Assessment, and comprehensive rescue training is at least as important to our guests as having a guide who knows how to interpret the natural history. In the San Juan Islands, Anacortes Kayak Tours continues to be the industry leader in raising the bar on staff preparation. In addition to including formal training with high level coaches, our guides spend hundreds of hours training in advanced conditions to prepare themselves for the responsibility of leading guests on the tours. Unlike many companies who have a brief training period prior to the season, our guides are continually educated throughout the year with a heavy emphasis on risk management and performing effective rescues. We couldn’t be more proud of their personal commitment to their profession.
Satisfying Our Customers by Meeting or Exceeding Their Expectations
Being attentive to our customers’ needs is something that we take very seriously. Every effort is made to place them on the most appropriate trip to meet their expectations. We are readily available throughout the summer to answer questions and concerns, and we work hard to make certain that we provide consistent quality and attention to detail on all of our tours. Our high rate of returning customers is our reward, and we really appreciate your business!
Promoting Active Lifestyles for Families and Children
In an increasingly plugged-in world we see the need for families to get outside and get active. Just by looking at our web site right now shows that you are part of that diminishing number of people who are looking for an engaged activity rather than passive entertainment. That’s a good thing! We are proud of our reputation as the most family friendly kayak operation in Washington, and we will continue to find new ways to ensure that families with children can get their bodies moving and experience the beauty of the sea.
Creating a Fun and Rewarding Work Environment for Our Staff
There are two big rewards that come with our creation of Anacortes Kayak Tours. The first is the satisfaction of being able to be a part of helping to create so many memories for the customers who come to share their time with us.
The second is our ability to provide a venue for so many guides to develop their paddling and professional leadership skills. We have been extremely fortunate to attract and retain some outstanding individuals over the years and we receive a lot of pleasure watching their personal growth. We could not be where we are today without their assistance and we appreciate their continuing efforts in helping us to create a remarkable organization.
