How this all started: The Story Behind WEGroup Global
- Mar 23
- 6 min read
Around 2016, a serial entrepreneur from Australia, Belinda Bradford (our founder), decided to step away from the pace of building businesses out of just an idea. She wanted space to think and to reset, so she did what she had always done when life needed perspective. She travelled, spent time near the ocean and went back to surfing.
During one of those trips in Australia, she met Serena Adams (now our Head of Destinations), one of the top female surf coaches in Australia, who was running surf adventures for women over 40. Something about those trips stood out immediately. Women arrived as strangers, and within a few days, they were sharing stories, laughing through wipeouts and having the kind of honest conversations that rarely happen in everyday life.
It was clear that surfing was only part of the experience. The women were there for challenge, for friendship and for a few days away from the constant noise of their routines. Around those dinners and beach walks, Belinda noticed something that felt familiar. When people travel together and step outside their usual environment, they open up more quickly and connect more deeply. But there was a problem. Booking and planning these trips, coordinating venues, finding hosts, designing schedules, and all the behind-the-scenes moving parts were challenging, time-consuming, and often commercially confusing for the average person to figure out. It was hard to do well, and even harder to repeat. That is where Belinda spotted the market gap
That observation turned into an idea, and Belinda restructured Surf Getaways and, together with Serena, she relaunched it. She decided that trialling the idea with a single activity, especially one she loved, would be her first step towards realising the bigger goal. Connecting women through shared experiences.Â
Chapter One: Surf Getaways
The early retreats were simple. Small groups of women travelling together to learn how to surf, sharing long dinners after full days in the ocean and laughing through plenty of wipeouts along the way. Strangers often became close friends in a matter of days. And stayed connected long after they went back home.
Belinda had seen that dynamic before while travelling. When people leave their daily routines and share an experience in a new place, conversations change. People talk differently, think differently and often return home seeing their lives in a new light. Organically, those surf retreats quietly became the testing ground for something much bigger.
Chapter Two: Woman Explore
Over time, the idea grew beyond surfing, as women who were not usually interested in it heard about the Surf Getaways experience. As a result, the retreats began to offer alternatives to surfing, including cultural journeys, creative experiences, and immersive trips built around learning, self-reflection, and personal growth.
Women travelled to places that challenged their perspective. Some wrote books they had been carrying inside them for years. Some saw those books appear on a billboard in Times Square or become best sellers in Australia and China. Others simply returned home with new friendships and a clearer sense of direction.
What mattered most was never the destination itself. It was the people they met along the way and the conversations that happened when the right group gathered in the right place. Often, these groups became lifelong friends and returned to book another retreat year after year.
A pattern kept repeating itself. People came home feeling different, positive, braver even.
Then the audience expanded
Over time, interest started coming from outside the original community. Founders, leadership teams, industry groups, and companies began asking about the business model and how it worked, and showed interest in similar experiences for their businesses or communities. We also started trialling mixed gender experiences.
Chapter Three: WEGroup Global
That interest in what we were doing started to meet a growing industry demand for easy-to-develop, cost-effective, high-quality experiences for broad groups of people. That demand led to our next chapter. This is where we are today.
And this is why WEGroup Global now designs and delivers in‑person experiences for founders, leaders, teams, communities and organisations around the world. Some are intimate retreats, others are multi‑day leadership off‑sites or larger gatherings for up to 100 people. The goal is simple: bring the right people together in the right place and give them the time and the environment to think, talk and reconnect.
The reality of doing this, however, for anyone who wants to do it alone using conventional industry standards, is not simple. Venues, hotels, facilitators, logistics, contracts, deposits and guest management are usually handled separately. Pricing is often unclear. Risk, both financial and reputational, sits with the host. Support drops off once contracts are signed. It turns what should be a meaningful experience into a complicated, high-risk and financially burdensome project.
WEGroup Global is the only company in the world that brings all of this into one simple-to-understand framework for its customers. One partner. One agreement. One point of contact. We manage venues, logistics, commercial terms, and customer support, and we provide additional marketing expertise and end-to-end on‑the‑ground delivery. With WEGrouposts are not carrying the complexity or the commercial risk.
Behind the scenes, we have access to over 8,000 premium hotels across more than 17 brands globally, including across all 50 states in the USA. We have access to activity providers, transport and catering providers, and can also secure VIP access to major events and concerts in almost any country, so each experience and price point can be tailored to the group's needs.
Our Pillars
EXPERIENCES: Lifestyle, Wellness, Business or Leadership Retreats, team off‑sites and in-person gatherings designed to create space for individual reflection, learning and connection away from the intense distractions created by an intense digital world. From women-only programs to bespoke experiences for mixed groups. We are also launching men-only retreats soon, so stay tuned!
NETWORK (coming soon): An alumni and introductions network that keeps relationships alive long after the experience ends.
FOUNDATIONÂ (coming soon): Scholarships and mentorship for emerging leaders who would not otherwise have access to these rooms.
MARKETPLACE (coming soon): A curated selection of products, brands, and opportunities from the WEGroup Global network, bringing together trusted partners to support personal and professional growth beyond the experience.
Who we work with
Creators and community leaders who want to host experiences for their audiences.
Founders and small businesses helping their clients to step away from daily operations to think about the future.
Industry associations and networks bringing their members together for leadership summits or business masterclasses
Corporations organising leadership off‑sites or annual team incentive conventions and retreats.
One thing hasn’t changed
We structure programmes so our retreat creators do not carry upfront financial risk. In most cases, no deposits and no minimum guarantees are required. Our team works with retreat leaders from the first idea through to the final day on site. We even follow up with each attendee when they have returned home so we can help our customers and our own teams improve the experience one retreat at a time.
As a result of our work and the great work our customers do in their businesses and communities every day, we have many new retreats planned in some of the coolest locations on the planet, and we now engage with people of all genders and from all walks of life around the world. And if you are thinking about hosting a retreat, leadership off‑site or community gathering, we would love to hear from you. Take a look at our latest retreats, themes and locations here.
Big shout-out to our crew
If you have been part of our journey, we say a BIG thank you! We’d also love to hear from you. Please let us know how you’re going, what you are up to, what’s the next challenge you are looking to smash through and more importantly, what destination you are looking to visit any time soon.
Just a heads up…... Many of the 2026 and 2027 experiences are already being planned in our calendar. If you are considering hosting one this year, you should get on it and connect with us now: Book your Free Discovery Call with our team (valued at US$500) to help you plan your retreat.
Connect with us here to plan your own retreat. Stay tuned for what comes next!
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