The best update ever from Hitlist, the startup formerly known at TripCommon

It’s been a busy summer full of changes here at TripCommon!

HIGHLIGHTS

• hired a new CTO, Luka Kladaric
• Gillian was named to PhoCusWright’s list of ’35 under 35' travel professionals to watch
• Pivoted to a new product, Hitlist

NOTES

We’ve debuted a new look at the TripCommon homepage to reflect the company’s evolving mission. Our goal as always remains the same: help people travel more (and help suppliers/marketers sell more travel) by providing consumers with the information most relevant to them.

We spent a year building the most flexible, customizable search engine out there. We learned a lot in the process. Like: when you’re creating a new product, you need to make it as simple as possible.

Our flight search engine is not simple (ref: gifofthemonth at the bottom of this email). It’s a work in progress with some incredible tech behind it. For now, we’re putting it on the back burner.

Our focus is now on Hitlist, an app which helps you build a list of cities you’d like to visit then lets you know when there are good opportunities to do so. Drop me a line if you’d like to see the deck and I’d be happy to send it along.

PERSON OF THE MONTH:

Luka Kladaric, backend programmextraordinaire.

He got into the US this week (from Zagreb, his hometown) and conquered jet lag in heroic fashion. For those that haven’t met him yet, Luka joined us in July after three years at Deviant Art, a 25m-member strong platform for artists to exhibit and discuss original works of art. We’re so excited to have him applying his experience building highly scalable web apps to TripCommon.

UPCOMING

• Gillian and Luka in SF October 1–5th for Concur (TripIt) developer’s conference
• App launch? — Dublin Web Summit, October 29th

WHY HITLIST?

Last minute travel booking (which we’re in a good position to facilitate) is on the rise. See this excellent PandoDaily piece on how a hedge fund with a history of picking winners thinks HotelTonight is the next big travel IPO.

GIFOFTHEMONTH

As ever, thanks to all of you who have supported TripCommon with advice, investment, and/or beer. We’re building something great and couldn’t do it without you!

— Gillian