We’re making some updates to the Pluto brand

Ever since we started Pluto in 2018, we knew we were going to build a travel brand with the mission of helping people make the most of their travels. But with the first product we launched being travel insurance, many people (understandably) saw us as more of an insurance brand as opposed to a travel brand. So today we wanted to share some updates we’re making to the Pluto brand that we hope will help better position Pluto as a travel company.

We’ve split the updates into four sections — how we talk about Pluto, how Pluto looks, the tools we make, and the content we produce — enjoy!

How we talk about Pluto

Actions speak louder than words, for sure. But we believe a few well chosen words can also be useful when communicating who you are to the world. That’s why we chose ours carefully.

Tools for travel lovers are the four words we’ve chosen to represent what it is Pluto offers to the world. “Tools” because as a team, that’s where our skills lie — providing best-in-class digital products that solve meaningful problems. “for Travel lovers”because that’s what we’ve always been about. Started by travel lovers, for travel lovers, we’re on a mission to help you make the most of your travels. That’s something we set out from day 1, and we don’t expect to change anytime soon.

With our mission and values remaining consistent, we refined other key elements of our brand DNA to help position Pluto as a travel brand. And importantly, a travel brand that’s relevant and differentiated. The best summary of these updates can be seen from our brand story, below.

Pluto was started by travel lovers, for travel lovers.

We believe life’s too short for mediocre travel.
You know the type. Tourist traps, soulless resorts, chain restaurants.
It’s not our jam. And if it’s not yours either, you’re in the right place.

So as a team of design enthusiasts, product people and techies, we decided to do something about it. We create tools to help travel lovers make the most of every trip.

Over time, we want to provide a suite of tools that support you through every step of your journey. Right now, we’re focused on three areas:

Making planning for a trip rewarding and hassle-free.

Helping you discover tried and tested recommendations from like-minded travellers.

Providing top-notch protection so you have the peace of mind that you’re covered when things don’t go to plan.

That’s us in a nutshell. We’re here to help travel lovers.

How Pluto looks

When we first created the identity for the Pluto brand in 2018, we knew we wanted to be seen as a travel player. So over the past few months, we’ve focused on returning to some of the principles we originally set out, whilst making a few refinements along the way.

Firstly, this meant introducing more travel photography throughout our experience. With a particular focus on people over places, to reflect our positioning of being here for the travel lovers. You’ll also notice our photography centres around capturing the everyday relatable moments that we believe make travelling special. Whether that be enjoying a meal with friends or capturing the everyday life of someone in the local community.

The other change we’ve made is to introduce a new brand font that we hope represents Pluto’s personality of being refined and trustworthy, whilst charismatic and quirky. Finally, the eagle-eyed and long-time Pluto followers will notice the injection of some of the bold colours that haven’t had the chance to shine as much over the past year.

The tools we make

Nothing has been more influential in the way people perceive Pluto’s brand than the products that we offer — releasing our travel insurance product was enough proof of that. Our product vision is to provide a suite of tools that support people throughout their travel journey, and we’re delighted that we’ll soon be launching our next tool — Pluto Pinboard.

From talking to travel lovers, we realised the process of organising a trip can be unnecessarily burdensome, particularly when doing so with friends. What’s more, finding the ‘hidden gems’ and ‘non-touristy’ things to do is painfully time-consuming. That’s why we’ve designed Pinboard to be the best way to create and share travel plans. With Pinboard, you’ll be able to:

• Organise everything you need for your trip in one place
• Invite others to your Pinboard to plan together
• Explore curated Pinboards from like-minded travellers

We plan to launch Pinboard to the world in the next couple of months, and if you’d like to be the first to try it, just add your name to the list here.

The content we produce

The final part to positioning Pluto as a travel brand will be creating and publishing relevant and differentiated content. There’s certainly no shortage of travel content, so we won’t be thoughtlessly contributing towards the sea of sameness. Instead, we’ll pick out the topics that align with our mission and that we have a unique point of view on.

The coronavirus pandemic has presented us with such an opportunity, as we created our ‘Bring travel home’ series — curated recommendations of things to watch, read, listen to, and cook — to help you experience a new culture from the comfort of your home. Expect more of where that came from.

That’s all for now. We’re always up for chatting more about this stuff, so feel free to drop me a message if you have any questions, thoughts, or feedback — harry@pluto.travel.

Originally published at https://blog.pluto.travel on May 15, 2020.