I have a travel startup that is meant to solve the planning problem in a different way, but I agree with Gary. We painfully learned that -
a) We created an elegant solution to free. That is always a bad idea
b) User acquisition is extremely hard without spending tons of money
c) Even though the users love the product, the fact that they would only use it couple of times a year means that you need to have lots of users, which circles back to the previous point
It sucks because the travel space really needs quality apps and I would like to believe that there is a way around all the issues for startups. But the fact remains that it is a bad idea for most people.
a) We created an elegant solution to free. That is always a bad idea
b) User acquisition is extremely hard without spending tons of money
c) Even though the users love the product, the fact that they would only use it couple of times a year means that you need to have lots of users, which circles back to the previous point
It sucks because the travel space really needs quality apps and I would like to believe that there is a way around all the issues for startups. But the fact remains that it is a bad idea for most people.