Teenage entrepreneurs enter cruise excursions battlefield
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Two teenage entrepreneurs are hoping to take a slice of the cruise excursions market with a new website.
Although only 19 and 16, UK students and brothers David and Jason Lipowicz are already ‘seasoned cruise travellers’ having taken four cruises and have used their experiences to develop a site that allows passengers to find private shore excursions.
Through TeamTourist.com the pair aim to deliver small group tours with an experienced local guide, but take advantage of a ‘group buying’ trend where passengers will be teamed up with others to split the cost.
Once a passenger joins a tour the site will find others to add, then when full the group are put in contact with the guide to arrange final details.
Speaking to Travel Daily, David Lipowicz said: “We’ve always taken private tours when we’ve been on a cruise (three with Royal Caribbean, one with Carnival), but they are expensive as a private tour is the same cost whether there are four of you or 10. We would always look to find others to go on the tour with us and book with another family but sometimes it would take a while for people to reply, so we thought to create a website that automates it all.”
Currently the site uses more than 50 tour guides in European ports, most of whom they have used. Others have been chosen by their TripAdvisor reviews, and the pair will not use anyone who has had even one bad review. Excursions vary from walking tours to foodie tours or visiting attractions.
Plans are to expand its excursion destinations to the US and Caribbean, while an app is under development.
Lipowicz added he is in talks with some third parties to expand its distribution.
“TeamTourist has been in soft launch for the past few weeks with tour guides uploading data and information, but since the launch we’ve had good responses,” he added. “We’ve got lots of plans for the coming year and we hope to be at some cruise events to promote the brand, plus I hope to go on more cruises for research!”
The video below explains it all a little further.
Who are the Lipowiczs?
The eldest David is 19 and a second year student at UCL, studying Computer Science.
He has just completed a three-month internship at Google and has gone through work experience at IBM.
Younger brother Jason has just started his A Levels at 16 and has set up a school club teaching other children to program websites.
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