Whether it be scaling volcanoes in Guatemala, sailing the Egyptian Nile by felucca, or delving into the depths of the Cambodian jungle, Sophie-Anne has harbored an obsession with exploration for as long as she can remember. She loves to be on the move when she travels and incorporates a range of adrenaline-pumping experiences to combine her passion for outdoor activity with a love of places and people.

“I feel an irresistible pull to the infinite promise of wild, majestic landscapes and forging human connections that reinvigorate a sense of wonder at the beauty of the planet and its diversity.”

Sophie-Anne grew up in a melting pot of cultural influences, with family hailing from far and wide including India, Uganda, and Canada, and having lived herself in Italy, Spain, the United Arab Emirates, and the U.S. before settling (for now!) in London. But it was her degree in anthropology and languages that proved the ultimate gateway to a career in travel, solidifying the belief that the magic of travel lies in each journey’s ability to enrich one’s perspective of the world through the lives they encounter along the way.

She’s enjoyed creating unique experiences all around the world for award-winning travel groups ever since. The last seven years she worked as Operations Manager and Global Travel Manager at Black Tomato, so she’s excited to continue her work in luxury travel with Origin.

“I’m over the moon to be joining such an ambitious, pioneering team at a very exciting time in their journey; sharing in a client’s anticipation as they set off to charter new horizons and in turn learn about themselves through the joy of travel is one of my favorite things about my job; it’s so special to see a truly impactful and memorable experience brought to life.”

Sophie-Anne believes that the meaning of luxury travel is unique to each individual — for some, it’s characterized by abundant human interaction and for others, it’s about getting lost in the wilderness. One traveler may revel in the artistry of hotel design while their companion only wants exclusive experiences they may never have imagined possible.

“The buzz of really getting to know my clients so that I can tailor an itinerary perfectly for them never gets old and it’s such a thrill to be a part of a team pushing the boundaries of what it means to be truly bespoke.”

Sophie-Anne joins Origin as a travel curator was originally published in The Curator on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

“I am so excited to join a tech-first travel company. There is nothing more invigorating than harnessing the power of technology to do more of what we love, and to do what we love better! Moreover, I am thrilled to be part of a team of such smart, talented, and dedicated individuals and to help shape the future of travel.”

Ioanna comes in with a remarkable wealth of insider knowledge and expertise of select regions where she’s traveled extensively and even called home. Italy’s winding streets of Tuscany, the wine regions of France, and the beautiful Coast of Barcelona are only some of the locations that she knows like the back of her hand.

In her early 20s, she biked all over the world while working as a cycling tour guide, following her passion to see as much of the world as possible.

“I love traveling by bicycle, for me it is equivalent to slowing down to see the world. But no matter what the mode of travel, most importantly, I love the local connections that I establish during my travels, learning the local language, and everything about the cuisine and wine!”

In her travel career, Ioanna has worked for luxury outdoor travel companies, managing trips all over Europe.

“Luxury is central to the trips I design but beyond luxury, what really brings a trip together is hospitality. To be welcomed in a faraway country, like a long-lost family member, is a feeling and a sentiment that cannot be topped. It creates gratitude and love for humanity and it’s one of the reasons why I love planning expertly designed trips.”

When asked what it is about that travel that makes it such a special experience, Ioanna replied:

“Travel spoils your senses and makes you love life and the world. A stroll through the fragrant countryside of Provence and a good glass of red wine in Saint Emilion will leave long-lasting memories on your palette, as will a hike to the top of Everest Basecamp for those three crisp breaths of air that you take on top of the mountain. There is something in travel for everyone and, if you are like me, you probably want to do it all — before it gets dark!”

Ioanna Yiasemi brings outdoor travel expertise to Origin team was originally published in The Curator on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

We are excited to announce that Federico Botta has joined Origin as a Travel Operations Manager, coming with extensive experience in the travel industry. He was formerly head of operations at Prior and COO at Blue Parallel, organizing once-in-a-lifetime trips for all types of clients. He has traveled to more than 30 countries worldwide thus far and is always looking forward to his next big trip.

Federico’s passion for travel is much more than just professional travel planning. He’s also a digital nomad, moving around while working so he can vet out the best properties and experiences himself, having lived in Chicago, Girona, Barcelona, Buenos Aires, and Southern Italy, among others. But one of his most rewarding pursuits is teaching sustainable tourism to future generations of professionals at the Universidad del Salvador in Buenos Aires.

The more I travel, the more I want to keep doing it. That’s why I became a digital nomad, because I truly want to keep growing as a professional and moving around allows me to do that while also discovering the wonders of the world.

Federico sees traveling as a way to connect with people and to experience different cultures through food, language, and seeing as many places as possible. He believes that travel is a transformative experience and that physical and economic barriers should be broken down so more people have the opportunity to go somewhere. He teaches his students how to drive positive impact in tourism so that not only the traveler benefits but also the local community.

We need to rethink how much tourism we want in a certain destination, make sure that the growth is sustainable, and always take into account the local community and the environment. Travel has the power to do a lot of good things, but it has to be managed properly and not be seen only as a source of income, because it’s so much more than that.

Federico Botta joins Origin as a Travel Operations Manager was originally published in The Curator on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

We’re excited to say that Origin is now part of the Conscious Travel Foundation! A social enterprise made up of professionals from the travel industry, all working to effect positive change on the impact tourism has on our world.

Ever since the start of Origin, we’ve known we want to do things differently.

We want to be part of a seismic change in the travel industry, and promote travel as a force of good. Our goal is to create trips that don’t take away from our environment, but that actively give back to the destinations, local communities, and our planet.

The foundation’s goal is perfectly in line with this. Its aim is to bring together resources, advice, and information from across the industry, and to help companies like Origin and their travelers have a meaningful, positive impact on the planet and their destinations.

Becoming a member of the foundation isn’t our first step towards changing the impact our industry has on the planet.

We always vet the accommodation and companies we work with and strive to work with green properties so travelers exploring the world with Origin can contribute to their sustainability efforts.

We also carbon offset our traveler’s trip quarterly, and although we know it isn’t the perfect solution, we see it as part of a larger picture to change our industry's approach to travel.

Joining the Conscious Travel Foundation gives us the chance to meet more like-minded companies, and together we can create even more change in our industry.

We’re looking forward to tapping into the resources and contacts the Conscious Travel Foundation has so we can further our goal of journeys with purpose, and promote travel as a force of good.

Origin is now part of the Conscious Travel Foundation! was originally published in The Curator on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

1. We curate the employee experience just like we curate our clients’ trips

Our goal at Origin is to ensure that the experience of each and every employee is just as personalized as the trips we plan for our clients. We continue to shape our employee experience based on the needs of our evolving team. We do this through radical candor, pulse surveys, and deep-dive discussion to understand what’s most important to our employees. Few early-stage companies proactively hire a Director of People to help create an exceptional employee experience, and it goes to show that our founders, Eli Bressert and Tamar van de Paal are truly invested in their team and ensuring that Origin is a people-centric and employee-driven organization now, and in the future.

2. We focus on providing a magical candidate journey during recruitment

Providing an excellent candidate experience for an early-stage company is so important. We aim to ensure a candidate has a positive candidate journey from the moment they apply to the moment they are onboarded as an employee and every stage in between. Even if a candidate isn’t selected to join us as an employee, we want to foster a strong network of company champions who love what we do and may still be able to bring their expertise to Origin at some point in the future.

3. We are 100% remote and encourage workations from anywhere in the world

We are a remote-first company, which means we focus on finding the best talent, regardless of where they are in the world. We encourage our team to work from home, from a boat, from a rooftop, or from their favorite travel destination! While we are a globally distributed team, we love to come together weekly for our All-Hands meeting and virtual themed happy hours, as well as in-person for team offsites throughout the year.

4. We are global citizens committed to a diverse and inclusive workplace

Origin is striving to be a truly inclusive work environment. We do this by providing equal access to opportunities, resources, and team culture for everyone, regardless of location. We also believe that having diversity of backgrounds, thoughts, and experiences is vitally important to Origin’s success. We have a huge opportunity and responsibility to scale Origin through the lens of diversity, equity and inclusion.

5. We give you the opportunity to help shape the future of sustainable travel

Origin is at an exciting and pivotal time, having just landed five million dollars in seed funding from Project A and other investors, and we are excited to focus on growing our team and super powering our efforts to drive change and revolutionize the way people travel. We are still small (but mighty), which means there is a huge opportunity for ownership and impact. Our goals are not only to personalize travel for each and every client but to make a global impact by leveraging sustainable travel practices. As a company and team, we are passionate about driving positive change for our clients and the communities in which we travel.

If you’re inspired to learn more about Origin as your next potential career destination, you can read more about our mission, team and opportunities here.

5 Reasons why Origin Should Be Your Next Career Destination was originally published in The Curator on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

This is one of the most common questions we get from our members, and although there are a number of services that can tell you the latest on countries opening up, they all miss a crucial element — personalizing recommendations to the customer’s needs.

That is where Origin’s newest feature comes in. We’re providing the first service (available for free to Origin users and members) that takes into account your travel style and covid restriction preferences to share truly personalized content to inspire your next trip. It’s a total game-changer for unique, effortless travel.

It’s much more than just a list of destinations — it’s unique, original adventures perfectly suited to how you want to travel.

Origin surfaces incredible experiences you can do right now, like star-spotting in the Maldives (open for vaccinated travelers with a negative test ) or visiting an Amazonian eco-haven such as the La Selva Lodge where you’ll get a front seat to Ecuador’s incredible biodiversity (without the need to quarantine).

Daily updates mean you’ll always have the most relevant information right there in the Origin app, and we’ll also send you a round-up each week with the new destinations and adventures that have opened up. With refreshed content every time any restrictions change, this feature is a natural extension of Origin’s mission to create truly personalized travel.

Origin’s new feature inspires travelers with content tailored to their Travel & COVID Preferences was originally published in The Curator on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Charlotte has spent the last 10 years working in the Content Marketing space, having started her career at Disney in London as part of the newly established Digital Marketing team. Working in pan-EMEA, UK & US roles during her tenure, Charlotte gained a vital understanding of international markets and the importance of tailoring content to local audiences.

Within these roles she was able to influence the rapid growth of social media marketing, rolling out a variety of international initiatives for ever-developing platforms including the web, Facebook, YouTube and Instagram. By launching new accounts on Instagram, watching thoughtfully crafted content go viral on YouTube, and continuously studying the unpredictable nature of media distribution, Charlotte became an expert in audience development and content marketing.

In the last 3 years, Charlotte served as COO for Style Me Pretty, a luxury wedding publication in the US, helping them to leverage their deep content roots in new and innovative business ventures. Managing all aspects of the business while overseeing editorial, social and sales teams during a global pandemic was quite a challenge but Charlotte believes it was all worth it for the experience:

“I learned so much about the relationship between content and sales, and that made me a much better strategist. I not only think about what makes a good story, but also what actions we want the narrative to drive, and how that will ultimately create revenue for the business.”

Charlotte’s passion for travel started at a young age, thanks to her travel agent turned world-traveler parents. She is never happier than when on the road and hates to finish a trip without something else on the horizon.

“There is something so special about the ability to experience new places and cultures. From the hum of the airport to the buzz of the destination, I just can’t help getting jitters at the prospect of going somewhere new and seeing something different.”

Her travel highlights include swimming with the whale sharks in the Maldives and white water rafting in New Zealand, although Charlotte also enjoys a remote beach and a good book. Joining Origin and combining her passion for travel and content in this role feels like the perfect fit and the opportunity came just at the right time for both.

“I knew I wanted to work in travel in the future, but didn’t know in what capacity. When I got connected with Tamar, I had no idea they were recruiting for a Head of Content but after a few conversations, it became clear that what they were looking for was what I already do. The product makes total sense to me, I love their vision, and I just knew right away that Origin was somewhere I wanted to work!”

Charlotte Piazza joins Origin as Head of Content was originally published in The Curator on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

We’ve made it even easier to find and save inspiration for your next trip

We’ve always known how difficult it is to find trustworthy travel content to help you zero in on your next trip, and so from the start of Origin, we’ve been creating inspirational items on a wide range of eclectic themes. However, user feedback showed that finding this content in the app wasn’t straightforward.

With this new update, we’re adding collections to make sure you can easily find trip ideas that speak to your travel style.

We’re trying out “Popular right now” to give you a flavor of what’s trending, and “Recently curated trips” so you can see how others are traveling with Origin. We’ve also added “New this week” for when you return to the app for more inspiration.

We also released saving your favorite items and are getting some good initial reactions. So, we’re providing an easy one-tap way of saving inspiration items as “Your Favorites”.

You can now share images, files, and voice notes in the chat

Chat is the most used feature of our app — who doesn’t love talking about future vacation plans or their next ski trip? You can chat directly with our Travel Curators at any time, and with these new features, we’re also making it even easier to share your ideas with them.

A picture is sometimes all you need to explain what aesthetic suits your accommodation style, and voice notes are ideal when you have a picture to paint and text just isn’t able to convey the same emotion.

We’re excited about these new chat capabilities and can’t wait to see what you do with them.

Manage end-to-end trip payments at the tap of a button

You can now easily pay for your trips right in the app, with no messy invoices that get lost in your email. Just clear, simple payments, in a few taps. We’ve also added Apple Pay integration, and all your invoices and receipts are saved in your profile right in the app.

We hope you love these new updates. There are so many more things we’re excited to bring to you in the future. We’re always looking for ways to improve, so if you have any feedback feel free to reach out.

Looking forward to your next adventure,

The Origin team

Origin app — new features mean seamless, inspirational travel in just a few taps was originally published in The Curator on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

We continue to expand our team with Virginia as Travel Operations Associate who joins us to improve all the operations processes & ensure competitive prices, allowing us to provide top-quality service to our members for every trip we design.

What captivated me the most about Origin is the vision and ambition to create something revolutionary for the travel industry. It is mind blowing to feel that what we are building today will be a massive game changer in the future.

Virginia arrives with a vast experience in travel planning as the former head of Operations at Blue Parallel, a bespoke ultra-luxe Tour Operator, where she stood out with her remarkable, detailed-oriented coordination skills in over 30 countries. Before that, she worked in the hospitality industry and at an NGO that provided intercultural exchange programs throughout South America.

Originally from Buenos Aires, Argentina, Virginia has worked and lived in Rio de Janeiro, Barcelona, Lisbon and Madrid.

Relocating to other countries and being able to connect with different cultures, people and places allowed me to grow not only in a spiritual way but in a professional way too.

When asked about her favorite destination she’s ever visited, Virginia said:

The world is just too diverse and too incredible to only choose one place, I believe that there is no such thing as a “favorite” place, but instead it’s the place where we ‘need’ to be.

Her favorite quote about travel is from Marcel Proust: “The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes but in having new eyes” and this is exactly what she thinks Origin is doing.

Our first Luxury Travel Operations Specialist, Virginia Rovagna joins Origin was originally published in The Curator on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Traveling is hard, and it shouldn’t be. This was the catalyst for launching Origin back in 2020 — Tamar and I wanted to make traveling easy while enjoying your experiences more. We researched the market, built prototypes, and recruited the dream team to crystalize our vision.

Just one year since joining forces, I’m excited to share that we have removed our waitlist and secured $5 million! The round is led by Project A with our long-time investor Cavalry Ventures to fuel our super-powered curators to deliver the best personal travel services in the market.

Origin was born out of a real need. We found ourselves at odds with little time to invest in building great trips for ourselves, friends, and family. There are great self-serve tools like Booking or Expedia to search for hotels, flights, and things to do. Unfortunately, the complexity of trip planning and managing is a time sink.

What about using traditional agencies? We tried them out and learned that the level of personalization through these services is underwhelming, while the only form of communication and services were the phone, email, or PDFs. Why can’t we funnel all of this through the most convenient form factor of an app on the phone?

With Tamar’s background in operations and marketing and mine in machine learning and AI, and experience with human-in-the-loop machine learning to superpower experts — we knew we could change the travel domain for the better.

So now that we have built a great foundation, what’s next? We will use the new funds to:

• Expand local knowledge and connections: Invest in people, data, and relationships to increase our destination coverage from 110 to 140 individual countries and offer an extra level of depth in each respective destination.
• Enhance the app: Continue to build the best travel app in the world, including accelerating the trip booking process through better tooling, adding on-trip functionalities to enhance the travel experience, and better-capturing feedback for future trips.
• Evolve our tools: Continue building internal functionality to superpower our curators. This way, they can design better experiences for you, faster.
• Build out partnerships: we will bring on new travel providers, hotels, etc., to increase access to undiscovered destinations.
• Accelerate content development: We will develop more diverse travel content to serve more unique interests of our members.

With this significant milestone, we are more amped than ever before to make traveling easy while delivering the best possible travel experiences to the world!

Onward!

Download the app or visit our website to join our journey

Origin Secures Funding to Make Traveling Easier was originally published in The Curator on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.