Congratulations. You’ve survived hectic holiday travel, awkward family moments and epic New Year’s celebrations. If you’re stuck indoors during this wintery blizzard hitting the east coast, then you’re undoubtedly fantasizing over your next tropical vacation and can’t wait to trade in your snow boots for flip flops. Chances are, you’re already familiar with TripIt, Airbnb and Hipmunk to navigate awesome travel experiences, but we’ve got five travel startups you need to know this year that is taking the travel game to new heights.
These 5 startups help you book flights, find the right hotel room, assemble an itinerary and save money — they’ll help you land amazing vacations at better prices than ever before.
Zaptravel — For When You’re Unsure of What You Want
I want a weekend getaway that will cost less than $400. You used to say these things to your travel agent, who’d use expertise to develop an ideal trip for you. But technology replaced the travel agent, and though there are myriad tools to help you actually book flights and hotels, sometimes you need help figuring out where to go in the first place.
Zaptravel is your digital travel agent, and it uses a semantic search engine to scull through its database (10 million flight routes, 2,000 destinations, 10,000 trip inspirations, 15,000 events, 400,000 hotels and 10 million hotel reviews), then sources the best price from several providers. Because so much travel planning time is spent comparison shopping — and time is money — Zaptravel scores every deal against prices for alternate weekends, similar hotels, favorable guest reviews, events at the destination during your visit, directness of flights and other criteria.
Adioso — For the Flexible Traveler Who Wants an Affordable Trip
Adioso is a Y Combinator startup that lets cost-conscious travelers who have a flexible idea of what they want to do on vacation see if there are deals available. If you search for something like, “New York to Bangkok in September for 11 days,” the results will provide a few itineraries and prices. If it’s too high, you can save your search an receive email alerts when prices drop. If you’re not dead-set on going to a specific place, Adioso could help you find a great deal on a unique vacation.
Tingo — For Hotel Price Adjustments
When you’re planning a trip and trying to stick to a budget, there’s no worse feeling than finding out the hotel you booked for $220 a night is now running for $180 a night. Tingo, which lets you book most of the hotels found on established travel sites (it’s a TripAdvisor company), will automatically rebook your room at the lower rate and give you a refund if the price drops. The difference will be refunded to your credit card shortly after your stay, and there’s no limit to the refund. About 45% of hotel reservations are booked online, according to Tingo, and Americans could have saved more than $300 million if the site existed in 2011.
Find My Itin — For Crowdsourced Itineraries
Travel planning is a major pain point for 49% of travelers, and travelers spend on about 29 days visiting 20+ websites during the research and planning phase. It’s a time-consuming process because resources for trip-planning are scattered and while you can find information about specific destinations, it’s hard to find a fully baked itinerary that connects the dots. William Tang and Scott Thompson — childhood friends with a penchant for travel and innovation — are integrating hashtags into travel planning to help you craft itineraries based on three pillars: inspiration, itinerary creation and sharing.
Peek — For Finding and Booking Stellar Activities
Once you’ve booked a flight and scored hotel deals, how do you figure out what to do when you get to your destination? Sites like TripAdvisor and other forums are full of clutter and can be outdated. Ruzwana Bashir is revolutionizing travel planning with Peek.com (see her own San Francisco itinerary here) , which is part travel agent, part tour guide. Peek curates high-quality activities, displays them in a visually beautifully interface and makes them easily bookable on whatever device you’re using. Peek gets a 15% to 30% cut of every activity booked through Peek.com. You can look for activities based on a number of categories — romantic, under $100, adventures, off-the-beaten-path, tours and more, or you can see what local celebs, chefs, musicians and travel editors note as must-sees in Peek’s “My Perfect Day” section of itineraries.
Now that you have these trip tricks in your arsenal, where would you travel to first in 2014? What products do you use to book your trips? Tell us about your experience and ideas below.
