February 20, 2018

Meet Alec Emmons and Seth Freedman of Driftr in The Arts District

Local Stories

Today we’d like to introduce you to Alec Emmons, Seth Freedman.

Thanks for sharing your story with us Alec, Seth. So, let’s start at the beginning and we can move on from there.
We conceptualized Driftr independent of, and prior to knowing one another while each of us traveled abroad.

Seth: I spent my early 20’s backpacking through Europe before settling into a real estate career. After Europe, I took a vacation to Jamaica with my family. We were based in beautiful Negril, in one of those all-inclusive sorts of packages. I loved jumping off the 60-foot cliffs at Rick’s Cafe, but I’m the type that can’t stay put for very long. I wanted to find more authentic Jamaican experiences. However, in Jamaica, the internet was tough to access and beyond that, I couldn’t find anything helpful on TripAdvisor, Lonely Planet, or Yelp. I finally found something through a simple old-school website and eventually we ended up having a meal with some friendly locals miles away from town. Deep down, I knew there had to be a better way to travel. Now, with a young daughter, finding those authentic experiences is important because my experiences become her experiences.

Alec: Meanwhile, on the other side of the globe, I was in Jaipur, India, exploring the city and attending the wedding between children of two diplomats.

Before we ventured around the world, my companion and I spent days researching and plotting our time in Northern India. We decided to plan everything ourselves. We contacted and booked a few tour guides for day trips, like to the Taj Mahal, and split our lodging up between a variety of locations on Airbnb. India can feel like one of the most overwhelming places in the world, especially when you first arrive. The traffic whips by in every vehicle imaginable: motorcycles, tuk-tuks, cars, trucks, bipeds, and even quadrupeds. As luck would have it, my companion had made a great decision for our first housing stop. Our hosts had experience with Americans and a son who spent years working for Microsoft, amassing a small fortune. They helped us make sense of the culture and assisted us with transportation.

Once in India, we soon discovered that despite hours of research, none of the plans we had made were really worth keeping. Our resources were lacking because, for example, we had the ‘what’ idea of going to Agra to see the Taj Mahal, but not the ‘how’ or ‘when’. We hadn’t accounted for the level of communication we needed to have with locals in order to have the richest, most fulfilling time. I remember wishing there was an app that could help us not only find inspiration from our social groups for places to go, but actually help us book those same experiences.

Seth: Fast forward to 2016, I invested in my friend’s travel app. We knew we wanted to do something in travel that would support and serve travellers. We batted around some ideas but my friend ended up pursuing other opportunities. In early 2017, I reached out to my friend who sources talent to help me build a team for Driftr. We found an awesome CTO but I wanted someone who had more experience getting a product off the ground and into the hands of investors.

Alec: Seth’s friend happened to be my agent for tech projects (yes, they exist). He told me there was a guy who needed help with getting investor materials and a business model together for his travel startup. I was mainly looking for product team jobs, but I agreed to take a look. I had just returned from a trip to Italy with my family, which posed similar challenges to the India trip in regards to finding places to go. I had a few lists of travel destinations recommended by friends, but coordinating the logistics was still a huge challenge. At that point, Driftr lacked focus as a product, but the actual product design was slick, so I thought, “Maybe there’s something to this.”

When creating investor materials, entrepreneurs need to produce market numbers that demonstrate the entire scale that their new venture can reach. Driftr had some broad assumptions about digital media and ads. I was cooling down from a three-year stint at a startup that serviced several digital media companies. There, I learned firsthand how challenging it can be to raise capital and revenue for a new venture in that space. After looking at the digital media market size, I realized that Driftr was barking up the wrong tree. That’s when I really started getting excited.

Seth: Alec started texting me furiously, basically saying, “I figured out how we need to evolve Driftr. We need to be in the travel industry, not the digital media industry!” And I said, “Okay, how?” He said, “I don’t know—we’ll figure it out soon.” Now 5 months later, after hours of tech calls with our product team, all sorts of consultants, content creators, influencers, and all kinds of hospitality proprietors, we’ve arrived at a business model that works for hospitality partners.

Alec: As soon as I realized that our business was based in travel/hospitality and not social media, I approached a close friend who graduated from Cornell and has worked in the hospitality industry for years. I knew he’d be able to help me determine if this was worth pursuing – he’s now an advisor and member of the founding team, so I guess that answers that.

Today, Driftr is a social travel platform that’s one part social media experience, one part influencer network & lifestyle media company, and one part hospitality booking service. The platform helps you plan, book, record, and share your travel adventures in a single space. Those within this space are known as Driftrs. Collectively, they make up a massive travel social network.

Has it been a smooth road?
Seth: Driftr began under a different name and had its awkward adolescent phase prior to Alec joining. Rebranding Driftr was definitely an obstacle. We pretty much had to start new. Most of the change was ignited after we realized we weren’t targeting the right market. The same went with deciding we are a hospitality-driven company and not a digital marketing platform. But true success comes in knowing and accepting that you either change and adapt or die trying.

We also experienced a couple classic early startup challenges. We started and then (fortunately) quickly stopped working with a few different vendors who brought more headache than solutions. We also rearranged the founding team a bit. The team is now an awesome group of dedicated individuals who bring their passion for their work, vibrant personalities, unique experiences, and a high degree of professionalism to the business.

So, as you know, we’re impressed with Driftr – tell our readers more, for example what you’re most proud of as a company and what sets you apart from others.
Seth: Driftr lets you share “moments” and “trips” with people you know and the world at large so you can capture and organize your travel experiences to inspire others’ traveling or they can even book and enjoy the same experience as you. This lets people explore and record their world in a familiar, social media-style format.

Alec: Currently, travel bookings are dominated by online travel agents (“OTAs”) such as Expedia, Priceline, Booking.com, and a myriad of others – OTAs operate on a commission-based fee structure.

Driftr is changing the game by moving away from the commission-based fee structure, and in turn helping owners and operators reclaim control of their booking platforms, while benefiting from the social media and travel inspiration aspects of Driftr. Driftr’s goal is to partner with and improve every commercial enterprise within the global travel industry.

We call our partnership program Driftr Places. For those interested in learning more about the benefits of Driftr and how we can partner to help their business, we’ve set up a special place in our website where they can get in touch with the team. We are especially and actively looking for partners around our home, Los Angeles, because it has so many unique neighborhoods, lodging accommodations and, of course, the greatest food in the world.

Seth: Beyond the hospitality industry, social media wouldn’t be what it is today without influencers. #travel is the 3rd most common tag on Instagram and travel influencers are some of the accounts with the most followers. This makes perfect sense because, generally, these are posts that contain staggeringly beautiful pictures of exotic places, and who doesn’t want a couple minutes of escapism in their life? The Driftr Network was created in November, 2017 to help enable and accelerate partnerships among brands, hospitality professionals, and influencers. The network now contains nearly 120 influencers and an aggregate social reach of +13MM across Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, and Pinterest.

Our non-exclusive Driftr Network is a place where brands and hospitality partners can be paired together with influencers. In addition to opportunities to get paid for partnerships, The Driftr Network provides influencers with access to exclusive travel and hospitality accommodations and lets them check out what our partners have been up to. In turn, they get some fantastic, exclusive content to bring to their followers.

Alec: Unlike hotels in the U.S. (⅔ of which are tied to huge conglomerates), a considerable number of the 400,000 non-fast food restaurants are small businesses. But just as hotels face industry-wide challenges from OTAs, Yelp charges restaurants a considerable fee to claim their business, and if they don’t, the damage to their online reputation can be catastrophic.

Driftr gives these owners an opportunity to have online visibility. However, the platform makes reviews between users and proprietors private so that they don’t influence others or publicly harm the reputation of the business.

Seth: We believe a lot of today’s online businesses take advantage of travelers and the travel industry. We want to create a community where everyone is able to benefit from the industry.

Let’s touch on your thoughts about our city – what do you like the most and least?
Seth: I was born in upstate New York and grew grew up in San Diego and El Paso Texas. Living in Los Angeles is, itself, a vacation. I live near west Adams and love having access all the the great local food and the culture and how every part of this this city has something cool to offer—holes in the walls, off-the-map taco joints, parking lot food, all the underground food gems. That sort of loops back into inspiring what Driftr is and what it represents. My biggest dislike is probably the freeway system. I know all of the shortcuts in LA and my advice for anyone who just getting to town is always “Stay off the freeway!”

Alec: I grew up in Portland, Oregon and went to college in Boston. I would say that I’ve paid my dues as far as weather is concerned and love LA’s illustrative skies. I live near the Griffith Park Observatory and hike to the top most mornings. If you haven’t had a chance to see the sunrise from the trails around there, you are missing out on one of the free natural wonders of Los Angeles. As a music grad, I also love the access to seeing world class talent all over the city. I have always disliked being in cars, so my dislike about LA is easy: the traffic. Fortunately, I can walk or take the subway to most places and can stay out of my car.

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