Gapwork.com Celebrates its 10th Birthday on December 29th 2010

On December 29^th 2010, it is 10 years since entrepreneur team Kirsty Collinson and Rebecca Jordan first launched their gap year website dedicated to travellers wanting to find work, or just play abroad. Since then Gapwork.com has grown and expanded rapidly to be the essential online guide to taking a gap year. Packed full of information about companies who offer and organise gap year placements, volunteering jobs, or seasonal and temporary work, it also offers up-to-the minute news, tips, advice, case studies, and essential guides to gap years. Gapwork focuses on providing users of the site with a comprehensive range of gap year companies and providers.

The travel website Gapwork (http://www.gapwork.com) began life as the brainchild of Rebecca Jordan and Kirsty Collinson who wanted to offer useful, interesting and important information to backpackers, and gap year students wanting to find out how, where and who to choose to help them organise their gap year jobs abroad.  Kirsty Collinson had just returned from a gap year in Australia and had experienced at firsthand, the huge back packer and volunteer job market.

Rebecca Jordan said: “Gapwork started 10 years ago, when a friend of mine called me and asked me if I knew anything about working in France for the summer. I was amazed that there wasn't a website that would provide that kind of information, and knew that there was a "gap" in the market!”

They quickly found that there was very little useful information for wannabe gap years to find on the internet so they decided to set up their own website to fill the gap. The first version of Gapwork.com was funded by a £500 loan from their family, and immediately after its launch online started receiving visitors to the website resources. From then on, over the next few years, revenue grew steadily and now the company has a dedicated core management team that has ensured the successful growth of the business. The Gapwork.com service doesn’t offer to organise gap year activities on behalf of individuals, instead the advertisers and content on Gapwork.com is kept right up to date with all the latest fantastic gap year trips, exciting activities, volunteering opportunities and destinations that are available these days.

Gapwork.com started making money selling online advertising to travel companies on the site, then the idea, and the product, quickly grew to include an email subscription service for traveller’s jobs and vacancies.  Out of this fantastic gap year information a complete range of Gap Work travel guides were written, then published to be sold in high street book shops, and then direct to school libraries. They also produced education CD ROMs and organised talks in schools to students about how to find a gap year company, travelling safely, and the different types of jobs or volunteering abroad they can choose from.

Gapwork.com also offers vital information on what a gap year candidate can do where they can go, and how to make the most of their gap year. Gapwork has won many awards in the past ten years and has built up a great number of successful business relationships, including a large and continually increasing base of loyal advertisers who remain very happy with their advertising campaigns, as well as the great customer service offered by the Gapwork staff.

Gapwork.com has a user friendly and very easy to use website. Visitors to http://www.gapwork.com can simply browse the latest news, gap year travel company information, and find everything they need to know about planning their gap year or finding seasonal work abroad. Gapwork now employs 12 people at its head office in Leeds, West Yorkshire, and uses a host of local talent including web designers, programmers and consultants from the area.