Trip planning made easier?
New service ViaHero is taking the guesswork out of sightseeing
Hand-holding has reached a new level in the world of travel planning, and that could be a good thing — depending on what sort of traveler you are.
A website called ViaHero. com is attempting to take the guesswork out of sightseeing by serving as a matchmaker between travelers and local experts. These locals not only share advice, but also put together detailed itineraries which, hopefully, answer the tourist’s every need and exceed his or her every expectation. Well, that’s the plan, at least. The cost? Right now it’s $25 for each day of an itinerary. So a long weekend with three days planned would cost the traveller $75.
“We source our experts really carefully,” said founder Benjamin Preston, who came up with the idea while attending graduate school in Oxford, England.
“We used tour guides, travel bloggers and superhosts on Airbnb — people who are used to answering questions and understand what visitors want. The key is matching the right person with the right host.”
That matching is done via algorithm, though the ViaHero staff will step in to intervene when necessary, and clients always have the option of choosing their own host.
“Let’s say we get a request for a Havana long weekend from a vegan family that’s really into museums. We would likely match that family with the host who knows most about restaurants since they have such specific dietary concerns,” says Preston.
“But we’d also give the guest information on all our hosts, just in case they find another one more appealing.”
Right now, the burgeoning company is only operating in Cuba, Japan and Iceland, but it hopes to expand into Southeast Asia and Latin America in the coming year.
Which begs the question: is such a service useful or necessary? Will a “local expert” be able to assess your tastes and desires better than you can yourself?
Heck, a guidebook (and I’m speaking totally impartially here) usually costs less than $25. And it will give you itinerary suggestions, plus cultural information, restaurant reviews and history, so that you show up in the destination with some ideas of what it’s in store. You’ll arrive as an informed traveler, not just a dude with a list created by another dude.
Sure, I know: we’re all very busy nowadays.
But a study once came out about the correlation between vacations and happiness. It found that the greatest amount of happiness was experienced when planning for and anticipating the trip (the actual travel came second). So is a service like ViaHero robbing travellers of that pretravel endorphin rush? Only time will tell.