{"id":571476,"date":"2010-05-20T06:15:15","date_gmt":"2010-05-20T10:15:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.xconomy.com\/?p=81010"},"modified":"2010-05-20T06:15:15","modified_gmt":"2010-05-20T10:15:15","slug":"insidetrip-goes-mainstream-rates-itinerary-quality-provides-broad-lessons-in-online-travel","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/571476","title":{"rendered":"InsideTrip Goes Mainstream, Rates Itinerary Quality, Provides Broad Lessons in Online Travel"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
startups<\/a>, Internet<\/a>, travel<\/a><\/div>\n

\t\t\"InsideTrip\"<\/a>
\n\t\tGregory T. Huang wrote:<\/strong><\/p>\n

Think about the last time you flew anywhere. How would you rate the overall experience? Unless you\u2019re a bird, there were probably things that could have been a lot better—legroom, connection time, delays, quality of service, and so on. In fact, the general level of misery in air travel feels like it\u2019s always going up.<\/p>\n

But when you made your last travel reservation, your decision was probably based on price more than any other factor, with connections and seat assignments as secondary considerations. The question is, would you want more information about the flights themselves before you book them, if it were available?<\/p>\n

That\u2019s what entrepreneur Dave Pelter is currently exploring with his Seattle-based online travel startup, InsideTrip<\/a>. The company rates each flight based on 12 metrics, such as the age and type of plane, baggage handling record, on-time record, and how crowded it is. For Pelter, it all boils down to one thing: \u201cDo people care about quality?\u201d he asks.<\/p>\n

InsideTrip is part of a new wave of technologies and business models in online travel. It\u2019s not too surprising that Seattle would be a leader in the sector, since this is the backyard of Expedia (which includes TripAdvisor and SeatGuru), Farecast (now part of Microsoft\u2019s Bing Travel), and numerous smaller companies like Yapta<\/a> and Raveable<\/a>. Maybe it\u2019s because of the combination of a strong tech community and lousy weather.<\/p>\n

Indeed, several travel startups have been bubbling up around town lately. The newest ones aren\u2019t talking publicly yet about what they\u2019re up to. But they have attracted some interesting players. One of them, TravelPost<\/a>, was founded by former Expedia execs and backed by Ignition Partners and General Catalyst. Another, Off & Away<\/a>, is being incubated by Madrona Venture Group.<\/p>\n

Unlike those startups, InsideTrip is ready to talk about what it\u2019s doing. Pelter, a former airline executive and Farecast vice president, sat down with me recently to chat about his company, where it\u2019s headed, and how it fits into the broader story of online travel businesses. As of today, InsideTrip has officially emerged from beta testing mode and is opening its consumer website to the general public. It is also in the process of raising money and signing up new partners and customers for other parts of its business.<\/p>\n

This isn\u2019t the first we\u2019ve heard of InsideTrip. Pelter rolled out the beta version of his website back in March 2008 and got a fair amount of national press<\/a>. And just last month, he pitched InsideTrip to investors at the \u201cFirst Look Forum\u201d organized by the Northwest Entrepreneur Network<\/a> in Seattle—and won as the audience favorite.<\/p>\n

But to fully appreciate what InsideTrip is doing, you need to know Pelter\u2019s background. …Next Page »<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

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startups, Internet, travel Gregory T. Huang wrote: Think about the last time you flew anywhere. How would you rate the overall experience? Unless you\u2019re a bird, there were probably things that could have been a lot better—legroom, connection time, delays, quality of service, and so on. In fact, the general level of misery in air […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1747,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1,7,10],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-571476","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-internet","category-news","category-software"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/571476","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1747"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=571476"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/571476\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=571476"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=571476"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=571476"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}