You read the weblogs, use search engines, and scour frequent flier community forums in order to find the best deals on airfares, lodging, rental car rates, cruises, dining, entertainment, activities and visiting sites. You eventually score with a good airfare — say, $468.23 total airfare round trip in Basic Economy between Atlanta and Helsinki when departing on Sunday, March 24, 2019 and returning on Thursday, March 28, 2019 via British Airways as one of many examples…
Technology Solution for Booking Your Travel Experience: What Would Be Ideal For You?
…but you still have your work cut out for you. What do you want to do once you arrive at your final destination? What are the best lodging options for you? How are you going to get from one place to another? Where are the best places for you to grab something to eat?
Scoring a suite is fantastic — but do you really need one when you are traveling solo? Dining at the best restaurant can be an experience — but what good is it if the specialties of food which are offered are not to your tastes? Visiting a famous monument may not mean too much if you cannot stand crowds or are not much into history.
The point is that even after you score what may be an incredible bargain in one aspect, you still potentially face hours worth of searching for the overall experience which you custom design to your preferences.
Setting aside limitations for a moment, think about what you would ideally like to have in order to spend less time in organizing as close to the ideal travel experience for yourself as possible. What functionalities would you like to see which would be helpful to you that either do not already exist or are difficult to find?
Why I Ask You This Question
A technology engine called TruPrice was in development nine years ago; and its initial purpose was to compare the ancillary fees of airlines to give users the true price of the total airfare which they should expect to pay. The functionality was expanded to include the true price of renting vehicles. Although it was never completed, vestiges of it still exist — such as this official weblog and this YouTube channel which contains five videos.
The initial version of TruPrice was simple to use: simply add the base rate of what you were quoted; and then choose the products and services you would like to use.
In the graphic shown above, you can compare the cost of ancillary fees between rental car companies in Atlanta, for example. The rate plus tax per day is blank in the example — but of the services which were selected in the left column, Avis was the most expensive; and Enterprise was the least expensive — but then again Enterprise did not offer all of the services which Avis offered.
The initial concept was rudimentary; but it worked well enough to show its potential and impress representatives of both global positioning systems companies, travel search engines, and online travel agencies.
Due to a number of issues which arose, the concept was temporarily abandoned — but even back then, the goal was to create the ultimate travel tool which personalized an experience to your liking as inexpensively as possible with a streamlined graphic interface.
Summary
I was one of the three founders of TruPrice; and after meeting in person with the other two original co-founders and a person who is capable of creating the vision for which we were seeking in terms of technology, we are ready to start anew and attempt creating a much more robust version of this product again…
…but before we do, we are seeking your opinion: what is missing whenever you book your travel? Perhaps you are a business traveler and use a travel management solution such as Concur: what do you believe is missing from that which would benefit both the employer and the employee who travels?
Our long-term goal is to create a technology solution which would act as the gateway to your travel experience. You would initially create your own travel profile which would be saved; and when you are ready to book your trip, every component — airfare, lodging, ground transportation and dining as only four of many examples — would be tailored to your criteria in terms of pricing, comfort and preferences as only three of many examples. It would be designed to reduce the significant amount of time you would need to plan your trip while simultaneously giving you what you want out of your overall travel experience.
Please impart your thoughts and questions in the Comments section below. Thank you in advance.
All graphics and illustrations ©2010 by Brian Cohen.
