It was only a matter of time before Jetsetter, Gilt’s luxury travel vertical, got into same day hotel deals for travelers on the go. Another startup has been primarily playing in this space—Hotel Tonight, which just raised $23 million and is growing fast. Starting today, Jetsetter is debuting same-day, last-minute booking offers from Jetsetter-Verified hotels with the launch of “Jetsetter… → Read More
Jetsetter, the exclusive travel community for globetrotters, seems to be on a roll. In recent days, the company has announced a dozen some new corporate partners, a handful of new sale formats to entice customers, and new distribution partnerships with high-profile sites like Kayak, The Economist and the vacation rental service HomeAway.
But while many think of Jetsetter as a flash sales for… → Read More
Despite a couple big-name companies like Groupon and Zynga lining up for IPOs, the demand for private company stock on alternative exchanges keeps rising. Private stock transactions on SecondMarket in the first three quarters of 2011 totaled $435 million, a 73 percent increase over the same period last year. In the third quarter alone, there were $167 million worth of transactions on… → Read More
While the idea of ‘online to offline’ for purchasing is proving to be powerful in the local commerce world, the trend of linking the physical world to the web is producing a number of startups that are innovating beyond just purchasing from local merchants or finding a product nearby. Many of the most interesting startups that have emerged over the past year or so are making our lives in the real… → Read More
A few days ago at the All Things D conference, Marc Andreessen predicted that every wacky 1999 dot com business that failed would one day find success in a new incarnation. But what about businesses those dot coms killed?
Jetsetter is launching a personal travel planning service today that is essentially a travel agent 2.0. Thankfully, the earlier iteration of online travel sites so decimated the… → Read More
Fair warning: This is where I get all MG on you guys.
As someone who just spent forty weeks traveling around the world, there is no category of consumer Web sites that makes me angrier than online travel sites. More than any other category on the Web, the early incumbents– online travel agents like Expedia and Travelocity– rafted on an early tidal wave of massive convenience and cost savings… → Read More
The whole “flash sale” phenomenon is interesting. Traditionally, the idea of “impulse buying” has been viewed as a somewhat bad thing. Purchases are supposed to be thought out and studied — made only after you’ve considered things for a while, right? The Internet has flipped that idea on its head. But that’s not a bad thing.
Bloomspot is one of the newer players in the flash sale scene. Launched… → Read More
I’ve long been critical of how hotel rooms are found and booked online. It’s impossible to tell quality and cleanliness from a standard write up, photos and a star rating, let alone have any idea of the quality of things like the restaurant on site, the friendliness of the staff or the millions of other little things that can make a hotel stay a pleasure or a nightmare.
And no, consumer… → Read More
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