Tourist.com lists 56,000 local businesses with no commission

Tourist.com, a free app and website for independent travellers and small local businesses, lists about 56,000 businesses and receives 100,000 to 150,000 visits a month. Between 200 and 300 more businesses join each day, and founder Michael Litovchenko says none of that growth was bought with ads.

Litovchenko replied in writing to TravHQ’s five startup questions. This profile draws only on those replies.

The problem it started from

Tourist is aimed mainly at independent travellers. Litovchenko pictures a visitor who leaves the main square, walks a couple of blocks and ends up at a family-run restaurant whose menu is not in English. That visitor wants the local price, not the tourist price.

The owner of that restaurant sees the same visit from the other side. Foreign guests are welcome, but an online travel agency commission of 15 to 25% of the bill takes most of the profit on a table. The traveller the owner wants is the one the commission model prices out.

What it looks like

A business joins Tourist.com at no cost. Instead of paying commission, it chooses a modest discount or a small perk for Tourist users. At the counter the traveller shows a Tourist ID, held in the app or on an NFC card. Litovchenko describes that as the full transaction.

On 22 October the company added a “Book online” button. A business can use it to send visitors to its own booking page. According to Litovchenko, around 150 businesses turned it on within a day of launch.

What is different

Litovchenko sorts the apps travellers already carry into three groups. Map apps show where a place is. Review apps judge its quality. Deal apps sell prepaid vouchers and keep part of the price, which the business pays for.

Tourist sits outside all three. The business sells nothing through the platform and the platform does not sit between owner and guest. The owner decides the size of the discount, and any reservation is handled in the owner’s own booking system. The business therefore keeps the guest relationship and the full price of what it sells.

The traction so far

Litovchenko describes the balance plainly. “Honestly, supply is ahead of demand right now,” he says.

The company has roughly 56,000 listed businesses, 100,000 to 150,000 site visits a month and 200 to 300 new business sign-ups a day. Paid marketing aimed at travellers has not started. The company is raising a round to fund it.

For an operator, the shape of these numbers matters. A directory that fills with businesses organically has solved the harder half of a two-sided market, and the remaining task is to send travellers to a catalogue that already exists.

The people

Tourist has a team of five, with Litovchenko as founder. The legal entity is Tourist, Inc., a Delaware corporation.

How the business makes money

Litovchenko says businesses will not be charged, now or later. The revenue comes from travellers who pay for a Plus membership.

The free tier carries discounts of 5 to 15%. Tourist Plus costs $39.99 a year or $9.99 a month and gives access to bigger offers, reaching 60% at some venues. The owner sets every discount, so a deep offer is a decision the business has made for itself and not a fee imposed from above.

The next twelve months

The plan is to market to travellers in the countries where Tourist already has its largest number of partner businesses. Spending in places where listings are already dense means a new user opening the app is likely to find something nearby.

The booking button gives Tourist a second use beyond the counter discount. Every business that enables it routes reservations to its own system and away from third-party platforms.