The Smart Trip Platform token presale will start on April 16, and as you can imagine, we spend a lot of time presenting our project to various audiences these days. When we tell other people about Smart Trip Platform, they usually say, “wait, but aren’t projects X and Y doing the same thing? They are travel-related, too! Aren’t you afraid of the competition?” At this point, we patiently proceed to explain our concept and why it is definitely NOT the same thing that projects X and Y are working on. And why our platform is better — much more ambitious, yes, perhaps more challenging to bring to life — but better, different, more forward-looking. In other words, truly new.

First off, Smart Trip Platform is not an aggregator. We are not resellers of plane or train tickets. We are not trying to serve the same hotel bookings under the blockchain sauce. Of course, our platform will have hotels and tickets — it wouldn’t be a comprehensive travel resource otherwise. But it’s just a tiny portion of what we will have.

Neither will Smart Trip Platform be a reseller of expensive holidays. What we find bothering about a lot of our “competitors” is that they partner up with luxury hotel chains and cruise operators and essentially just offer the same thing you can easily book elsewhere — perhaps with some discounts and for tokens. We can’t but ask — how is this different? What is so revolutionary about selling a luxury cruise and recording the transaction on blockchain? To ensure safety and security? But existing systems of booking high-end hotels, car rentals from leading companies, or cruises are already quite secure.

What we feel our so-called competition overlooks is that tourism has changed profoundly. The future of travel industry belongs to millennials, to the Generation Z and Generation Y. Even the word “tourism” itself — associated with noisy large groups led around by a guide with an umbrella, talking into a loudspeaker — is becoming obsolete. The new generation are not tourists, they are travelers; they go further, deeper, higher, they venture where traditional tourists would never go. For them, a dream vacation is not relaxing in a lounge of an expensive all-inclusive resort; by contrast, you will find them in deserts, jungles, among mountain peaks. Smart Trip Platform is for them, first and foremost, even though travelers of all ages will surely will find using our platform a delight.

So what is required to disrupt travel industry? We believe a true 21st-century travel platform must offer two things: authentic experiences and a way to share them.

We already wrote that we are going to offer a wider range of travel services than any other resource: hotels, car rentals and cars with drivers, transportation, tours, jungle treks, desert expeditions, archaeological digs, volunteer projects, wildlife and birdwatching trips, safaris… And since any travel business can freely join and ecosystem and offer its services, we will also have organized tours, guided vacations, cruises, and so on. The choice is up to you: you can plan your whole trip alone, build an itinerary, contact service providers individually. Or you can book a ready-made tour and get to know other travelers in the dedicated chatroom before you leave. Or you can choose the golden mean and search for an itinerary posted (and already tested) by other users on the platform.

Sharing your travel experience will also be taken to a wholly new level with Smart Trip Platform. We are going to implement so many cool features for people to share itineraries, videos, reviews, photos… In fact, this topic deserves a blog post of its own, so we will leave it till the next time! For now, remember that the Smart Trip Platform pre-ICO begins on April 16. Visit our website http://smarttripplatform.io/ and subscribe to our channels on Telegram (https://t.me/st_platform) and Facebook (facebook.com/STplatform/)!