Tough economic times and shrinking budgets do not mean that your company must eliminate incentive travel packages. On the contrary, there are many cost-effective packages that will meet your needs and reward your employees for their hard work, without breaking the bank.

For example, companies based in Los Angeles, or other Southern California cities can opt for incentive travel that is a little closer to home and far more cost-effective than extravagant, exotic trips. Two- to four-day incentive cruises that stop in San Diego and popular Mexican ports provide a number of low-cost options for incentive travel. Other options include weekend trips to Solvang or Santa Barbara, or train trips up the coast.

Companies that are based in Seattle, Tacoma or the Greater Puget Sound area also have a wide variety of low-cost incentive travel options. Amtrak offers special train travel packages to the popular town of Leavenworth at certain times of the year and has regularly scheduled service to Vancouver, Canada. Seattle also has a major cruise port with cruise lines offering two- to four-day cruises to Victoria Island and Vancouver, or to stops along the coast to San Francisco, California.

These, of course, are just a few options that are available for these two major business centers, but regardless of where your company is located, there are cost-effective incentive travel packages available that will assist you in showing your appreciation to employees and encourage high productivity, while helping you stay within your allotted travel budget.

When opting for adventure travel for team building, there are several factors to keep in mind. First and foremost, it is absolutely essential to choose an adventure travel option that is accessible to all of the members of your team. Differing levels of physical fitness, disabilities that may require accommodation, dietary restrictions and religious affiliations should all be considered when determining the type of adventure travel that is an appropriate choice and will meet your needs.

Since the point of this type of travel is to encourage your employees to work together and to build team spirit, it is exceedingly important that no one will feel left out or will have to decline the experience due to one of the abovementioned factors. While it is true that team building adventure travel should push employees to leave their comfort zones and for the team to find and rely on the different strengths each of member, there is a distinct difference between encouraging a loner to participate and putting someone in an extremely uncomfortable position that alienates them from the rest of the team due to physical characteristics, abilities or beliefs.

Considering these factors during the selection process will assist you in ensuring that you do not waste resources on an ineffective team building experience and will help you avoid the pitfall of setting your team up for failure, rather than success.