Travel companies often have a lot of data about travelers. And while that information might offer details about client interests and travel preferences, often little is done with it.
The Trip Boutique, an AI-powered technology solution, aims to change that for agencies by turning data into insights that make it easier and faster for advisors to plan clients’ travels.
“We help them make sense of who their clients are,” said Fernanda Barrence Mutz, the company’s CEO and co-founder. “At the same time, we help them understand better their product portfolio — the experiences, the properties, everything that they are selling to their clients.”
The Trip Boutique was founded in 2017 as a B2C platform but shifted fully to B2B last year after getting interest from the industry and working successfully with destination management organizations and online travel agencies.
For travel agencies, the Trip Boutique offers several modules, many of which are built with AI-powered capabilities: a Knowledge Hub, centralizing things like destination and product information; a customer relationship management (CRM) system; an itinerary builder; data analytics; and marketing tools. All are accessed via an online dashboard.
A booking agent that will enable advisors to book recommendations via The Trip Boutique is slated to launch in the second quarter of next year.
The modules work together to help advisors more effectively use the client data they have. For instance, clients are onboarded via a quiz that begins data collection (Mutz said the company can also mine data from existing CRM systems). AI uses that data to help match clients with personalized recommendations from the Knowledge Hub. The itinerary builder generates itineraries within seconds, and the marketing module ensures clients are only getting email campaigns with relevant packages.
“All the modules act as a co-pilot for [agencies],” Mutz said. “What our solution does is it mimics the work that they already do themselves, understanding who their clients are and then thinking of what are the best recommendations for them.”
The Trip Boutique was not designed to cut out advisors but to enhance what they do, Mutz said. The Knowledge Hub module is one of the most popular features among the agencies testing The Trip Boutique, she added, saying that advisors find it enhances their own knowledge and reassures them that a product or destination is right for their clients.
Mutz said agencies also find the solution to be intuitive, making it easier to onboard new advisors.
A partnership with Amadeus
The Trip Boutique recently entered into a partnership with Amadeus, which will offer the company’s portfolio of solutions to Amadeus’ agency customers. Mutz said the partnership will create a new pipeline of customers for The Trip Boutique, which currently works with around 10 agencies.
Noureddine Hajji, strategic alliances and partnerships manager of Amadeus, said the company was attracted to The Trip Boutique’s “deep understanding of the travel industry, particularly in luxury travel and AI-driven hyper-personalization.”
That knowledge of the industry, Hajji added, is a differentiator for The Trip Boutique compared to other companies with similar tech products. Hajji also praised The Trip Boutique’s model, which keeps advisors central: “It is important to emphasize that the role of a real travel advisor remains crucial in providing unmatched customer confidence and satisfaction.”
One of the agencies testing The Trip Boutique is McCabe World Travel in McLean, Va. Amanda Halacy, McCabe’s senior director of strategy and development, has been on an 18-month mission to overhaul the agency’s tech stack, including introducing new processes and systems. Right now, McCabe is testing The Trip Boutique with two independent contractors and one in-house advisor.
The agency is moving slowly with the test because opinions on AI tend to vary among advisors, but “we feel really excited about where we’re headed with them,” Halacy said.
The most exciting feature, she said, is “the ability to have a more complete client profile.” While seasoned advisors tend to know longtime clients well, that capability is especially helpful for newer advisors or advisors with newer clients, she said. It offers a full picture of the client and their wants, needs and travel history.
Halacy is also bullish on The Trip Boutique’s recommendations for clients, for which it draws information from a number of McCabe’s trusted sources, like Virtuoso and Michelin Guide.
Individual users can sign up for The Trip Boutique for $39 per person, per month, including all of its modules. The licensing fee for agencies depends on the agency’s size, scope and modular usage; there is an enterprise discount based on volume.
