Muscovites can now easily escape the noise and pollution of the Russian capital for a spontaneous week-end trip thanks to Travelata.ru, a new website specializing in short range impulse travel that launched its beta version on Monday.
The site offers tours on weekends or short holidays in Russia, near abroad countries like Turkey or Latvia as well as more remote popular destinations like Paris or Rome. “We usually offer destinations that are no more than 3 or 4 hours to fly to,” said Travelata’s co-founder and CEO Alex Zaretsky, a former McKinsey associate, in an exchange with East-West Digital News.
The startup currently offers 30 destinations from 25 Russian tour operators. “But in a few months our catalog will count hundreds of offers, from both Russian and foreign operators,” Zaretsky said. Travelata also plans to extend its service to bases in St Petersburg and Ekaterinburg, Russia’s second and third largest cities respectively.
Travelata founders got their inspiration from such sites as German Travel24 and Israeli Daka90. “Inspiration isn’t cloning,” Zaretsky says, “because the concept required several adaptations for the Russian market. Working with local tour operators here is more difficult because the market is very fragmented. The quality of these partners’ IT systems leaves something to be desired, and this can create serious integration issues.”
No direct competitors on the domestic market
In the long term, Travelata aims to follow the path of UK giant LastMinute.com. “They started from city break deals and then diversified to a very wide range of offers for impulsive customers,” Zaretsky explained. “We are also starting with tours, which are easier and cheaper to promote on this very specific segment.”
Travelata claims that the market for its services could be worth as much as $885 million, based on 2 million potential upper middle class customers in Russia.
Zaretsky sees no direct competitors on the domestic market. “There are many sites on the travel segment, but none has a specialization like ours. Hipclub.ru also offers packaged tours, but they focus on discounted deals rather than on short tours.”
The startup is seeking to raise funds in its first round of financing. To date, it has been financed by its founders with angel support from Bas Godska, a former marketing director of Lamoda.ru.
