CreateTrips
closedMobile travel guide library with worldwide offline maps and social trip planner.
| Date | Investors | Amount | Round |
|---|---|---|---|
| investor investor | €0.0 | round | |
| investor | €0.0 | round | |
* | N/A | $800k | Seed |
| Total Funding | 000k | ||
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CreateTrips was a mobile-first travel technology company that operated as a social trip planning platform. Founded in Helsinki, Finland, in 2013 by Jarkka Salminen and Jesse Luoto, the startup aimed to change how travelers research and organize their vacations. The company secured a total of $1.4 million in seed funding over two rounds, with investors including Butterfly Ventures and Frontier. The initial $600,000 was raised in June 2014, followed by an additional $800,000 in March 2015, which was intended for user acquisition and further platform development.
The core of the business was a mobile application that allowed users to discover destinations and create personalized travel itineraries. It aggregated content, tips, and photos from a community of users, including travel bloggers and specialists, to provide recommendations for attractions, restaurants, and other venues. A key feature was the ability for users to save their customized trip plans and maps for offline access, a significant benefit for travelers looking to avoid international data roaming charges. The platform's business model included in-app purchases for offline maps and a revenue-sharing component for content creators. Travel bloggers could create and sell mobile travel guides, called 'TravelBooks', earning 50% of the selling price.
Despite its initial funding and user-focused features, CreateTrips ceased operations in 2016. The closure was attributed to a disagreement among the founders regarding the future strategic direction of the company. One of the founders, Juha-Petteri Kukkonen, communicated the company's demise to its user base and subsequently launched a new, separate project called TripElite, targeting high-end travelers. Keywords: mobile travel planning, social trip planner, travel itineraries, offline maps, user-generated travel guides, travel tech, Helsinki startup, Jarkka Salminen, Jesse Luoto, Butterfly Ventures, travel content monetization, TravelBooks, trip customization, travel discovery, itinerary builder, travel app, destination guides, offline travel, social travel