Travelloc offers a combination of social network, travel guide, and recommendation platform with its app of the same name. We spoke with Tim Aumüller, one of the co-founders of Munich startups spoken.
1. Who are you and what do you do? Please introduce yourselves briefly!
Travelloc was founded in Munich in 2018 by Sebastian Leonhard, Sudhanshu Vora, Aref Attar, and me. Each of us brings valuable experience to the company, and we all share a common passion: exploring and sharing exciting locations all over the world. Sebastian, 31, previously worked in strategy consulting. I, also 31, and spent over three years supporting the development of Deliveroo in Germany. Sud, 29, is an experienced software and mobile developer. Aref, 49, has many years of management and business development experience.
Travelloc is the new social travel app that makes it incredibly easy to discover, save, and share locations—tailored to individual tastes and for any city in the world. We draw on the experiences of user-specific networks and restaurant and travel experts to create personalized travel guides for each user. It's all about recommendations you can truly trust. Our clear mission is to revolutionize the opaque travel recommendation market and make it more accessible to users.
Tips and recommendations from friends and acquaintances
2. But that's been around for a long time!
Quite the opposite! The concept behind Travelloc is unique in the market. With our app, we solve a problem that most of you will be familiar with: you're in a new city and looking for a restaurant or the right bar for the evening. The most reliable tips and recommendations are always from friends and acquaintances. Relevant rating platforms usually only match your taste with luck. Until now, however, recommendations from your personal network required countless messages or "views" on social networks, while simultaneously trawling through travel magazines and blogs.. With Travelloc, we offer a completely new approach to solving this problem and guiding our users easily and conveniently to places that exactly match their tastes.
3. What has been your biggest challenge so far?
The biggest challenge at the beginning was that, although we had the idea for Travelloc, we lacked the technical expertise to implement it. We finally found our fourth co-founder in Sudhanshu, who, as an accomplished software developer, brings exactly the right expertise to our Travelloc team. However, we soon realized that programming an app was more time-consuming than expected and associated with significant setbacks. But we never let that discourage us.
Another real challenge was and still is accepting that not everything can always be implemented immediately and directly, but sometimes requires a little more time. Nevertheless, it's fascinating every day to see how your own product continuously evolves and improves from the first wireframe to the current app.
Next step for Travelloc: Launch of the Android app
4. Let’s get down to business: How is business going?
We're extremely pleased with the launch. The app is being well-received, confirming that the market has been eagerly awaiting a solution like Travelloc. The launch of the Android version is planned for September 2019, which will significantly expand our reach. We've also been able to convince the first influencers, city magazines, and industry experts of our concept, who have already begun sharing their favorite locations with the Travelloc community. Useful new features, such as the ability to book restaurants at discounted rates through Delinski, are also helping to quickly establish the platform.
“The startup scene in Munich has been developing very positively for years”
5. What does Munich mean to you?
We are all committed Munich residents by choice. The city has become a second home to each of us, where we have already spent several formative years. Munich offers all the facets of a big city while remaining manageable. This enhances the feel-good factor—there's hardly a better quality of life in Germany than in Munich.
The startup scene in Munich has been developing very positively for years. Concepts such as Plant1 They offer great opportunities for founders and are definitely a step in the right direction. Nevertheless, there's still a lot of room for improvement here—for example, regarding the limited availability of affordable co-working spaces. All in all, apart from Berlin, there's probably no other German city as attractive to motivated founders as Munich.
6. How will your startup become the next unicorn? Or will we see you soon at Epic Fail Night?
With Travelloc, we're solving a problem that our generation, in particular, repeatedly grapples with when it comes to planning city breaks or other travel. Individuality is more in vogue than ever, and the mainstream is increasingly being pushed aside. Therefore, we're going so far as to say that we certainly won't see each other at Epic Fail Night. But we're realistic enough to know that hard work and dedication aren't always enough to run a successful startup. A healthy dose of luck is also required. We're confident that with Travelloc, we've chosen the right path to revolutionize the travel market and make it more accessible.
7. Fish on a stick or pork knuckle?
Three pork knuckles, please. And an extra portion of dumplings for Sudhanshu, our committed vegetarian.
