The Tourist Research Center (TRC) was founded in the mid 1960s by a small group of researchers who felt the need to meet and exchange experience of research in tourism. Their decision at the time was to a great extent a reaction to larger organizations and their conferences, in which participants tended to talk at each other from the platform rather than confer and discuss. The first meeting took place in 1965 in Brugge.

The mission is double; firstly to promote exchange of research experience in tourism and secondly other forms of co-operation among its members.

(Quote TRC)