Crates of peppers, artichokes and radicchio outside a greengrocer on a market lane in Bologna

Privacy policy

What we learn from your emails and bookings, why we need it, who sees it, how long we keep it and how to ask for a copy or deletion.

Last updated October 20, 2026

Market lane, Bologna

Who is responsible for your data

Forkful Field Trips is a small-group food tour company registered in South Carolina, USA, with its office at 174 Meeting Street, Suite 302, Charleston, SC 29401. We are responsible for the personal information described in this policy. For anything about your data, write to [email protected] with “Privacy request” in the subject line, or send a letter to the office address.

This policy covers this website, the emails you send us, your bookings, gift cards and our monthly email. It does not cover the websites of hotels, restaurants or other companies we link to.

Personal information we collect and where it comes from

This website has no forms that send data to us. Every enquiry, booking, gift card order and newsletter request reaches us as an email that you write and send from your own email program, so we only receive what you choose to put in it.

Enquiries: Your name, email address, phone number if you give it, the tour and dates you ask about, how many of you are traveling, room type and anything else you write.
Bookings: The full name of each guest as it appears in the passport, confirmation that every guest is 18 or over, contact details, an emergency contact, room sharing, arrival and departure details, and passport details only where a hotel, rail operator or local authority requires them.
Dietary and health notes: Allergies, intolerances, diets and any mobility needs you tell us about. This can count as health information, so we only use it with your consent and only to plan your meals and your days.
Payments: The amount, date and method of each payment. Card payments are taken through a secure payment link from our card processor; we never see or store your full card number. For bank transfers we see the name and bank details on the transfer.
Gift cards: The buyer’s name and email, the recipient’s name and email if we send the card to them, the delivery date and the message for the card.
Monthly email: Your email address, your name if you give it, and the destinations you tell us you are interested in.
Website visits: Our hosting provider’s servers record the technical data every browser sends: IP address, browser type, the page requested and the time. These logs are used only to keep the site running and secure.

Why we use your information and our legal reasons

To answer your questions and send dates, prices and seats. Legal basis for visitors from the EU or UK: steps you ask for before a contract.
To book and run your tour: hotels, restaurants, classes, transport and your host. Legal basis: performing our contract with you.
To plan meals around allergies and diets and days around mobility needs. Legal basis: your explicit consent, which you can withdraw at any time.
To take payments, keep accounts and meet tax and legal duties. Legal basis: legal obligation.
To send the monthly email with new dates and offers, only if you asked for it. Legal basis: consent. Every email says how to stop it.
To keep this website secure and working. Legal basis: our legitimate interest in a safe website.

We do not use your information for automated decisions, profiling or advertising, and we do not buy mailing lists.

Who receives your information

We share only what each company needs to do its part of your trip or our work:

Hotels, restaurants, producers, cooking schools, rail and transport companies and your local host in the country where the tour runs: guest names, room sharing, arrival times and dietary notes.
Our email and file storage provider, which holds our mailboxes and booking files on servers in the United States.
Our card processor and our bank, which handle card payments, transfers and refunds.
Our accountant, for invoices and tax records.
Public authorities, only where the law requires it, for example hotel guest registration in Europe and Japan.

We do not sell your personal information and we do not share it for targeted advertising, as those terms are used in California law.

Data sent to other countries for your trip

We are based in the United States, and our tours run in Europe, Japan, Mexico and the USA. Your booking details therefore travel between the US and the country of your tour. For guests in the EU, UK or Switzerland, sending the details a hotel or host needs is necessary to perform the contract you made with us. Our service providers protect data they hold for us with contractual safeguards such as the European Commission’s standard contractual clauses or an equivalent mechanism.

How long we keep your information

Enquiries that do not become a booking: Two years after our last email, then deleted.
Booking and payment records: Seven years after the tour, as US tax rules require.
Dietary and health notes: Deleted 90 days after your tour ends, unless you ask us to keep them for a future trip.
Gift card records: Until the card is used or expires, then seven years for the accounts.
Monthly email list: Until you ask to stop.
Website server logs: About 30 days.

How we protect your information

Our mailboxes and files are protected by strong passwords and two-step sign-in, and only the four people in our Charleston office can open booking files. Hosts and suppliers receive only the details they need for your days with them. Please do not email us card numbers; Lena sends a secure payment link instead.

Your privacy rights in the US, EU and UK

Wherever you live, you can ask us for a copy of the information we hold about you, ask us to correct it and ask us to delete it, unless we must keep it for tax or legal reasons. You can stop the monthly email at any time.

EU, UK and Swiss visitors (GDPR): You also have the right to restrict or object to our use of your information, to receive it in a portable format, to withdraw consent at any time without affecting earlier use, and to complain to the data protection authority where you live or work.
California residents (CCPA): You have the right to know what personal information we collect, use and disclose, to delete it, to correct it, to limit the use of sensitive personal information and to opt out of its sale or sharing. We do not sell or share personal information, and we use health notes only to provide your tour. We will not treat you differently for using these rights. You may use an authorized agent.
Other US states: Residents of states with similar privacy laws, such as Virginia, Colorado, Connecticut and Texas, can use the same rights by writing to us. If we decline a request, you can appeal by replying to our answer.

To make a request, write to [email protected]. We confirm your identity by replying to the email address we already have for you, and we answer within 30 days (45 days for California requests, which we may extend once if we tell you why).

Children and age limits

Our tours and this website are for adults. Every guest must be 18 or over, and we do not knowingly collect information about anyone under 18. If you think a child has sent us their details, write to us and we will delete them.

Changes to this privacy policy

We update this policy when our work or the law changes. The date at the top shows the latest version. If a change affects how we use information we already hold, we tell guests with a booking by email. Postal address for privacy requests: Forkful Field Trips, 174 Meeting Street, Suite 302, Charleston, SC 29401, USA.