Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Show HN: Duffel (YC S18) – A faster way to sell flights

duffel.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

41–50 of 69 posts

Re: Show HN: Duffel (YC S18) – A faster way to sell flights

#41

Post by crazygringo »

notafraudster wrote: post #23

It probably bodes a little poorly (either for the product, or for the product's applicability to this website) that almost every comment seems to be confused about what the product is or why anyone would ever use it. I've read the original post several times and I still don't understand myself. I read the main page and I can't tell if I'm meant to be in the target market or not. I clicked on Pricing and I don't under…

Yeah it gives zero indication who this is for.

Reading from comments here it seems like travel agents and tour operators? But then I don't really understand that, they already buy flights on behalf of customers so how is this an improvement?

I still have no idea who this is actually for or what the value proposition is. What, precisely, is this trying to replace, and for who?

Give me the top three business case examples and then maybe I'll understand it.

Re: Show HN: Duffel (YC S18) – A faster way to sell flights

#42

Post by jaequery »

stevedomin wrote: post #40
xyzelement wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This was my vibe as well. Maybe it's one of these "if you have to ask, it's not for you" cases, but I agree with your words: it doesn't bode well that on the post (as deep as I went) it doesn't mention who the customer is.

> Maybe it's one of these "if you have to ask, it's not for you" cases Kinda agree but also think we should do a better job making it explicit who the target is. Thanks for the feedback

Why not try clarify it for us here ?

Re: Show HN: Duffel (YC S18) – A faster way to sell flights

#43

Post by brudgers »

stevedomin wrote: post #40
xyzelement wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This was my vibe as well. Maybe it's one of these "if you have to ask, it's not for you" cases, but I agree with your words: it doesn't bode well that on the post (as deep as I went) it doesn't mention who the customer is.

> Maybe it's one of these "if you have to ask, it's not for you" cases Kinda agree but also think we should do a better job making it explicit who the target is. Thanks for the feedback

Who is the target?

I am intellectually, curious.

Thanks.

Re: Show HN: Duffel (YC S18) – A faster way to sell flights

#44

Post by stevedomin »

kotaKat wrote: post #15
ceejayoz wrote: post #3

> Quickly and dynamically add markups to fares when creating a link and easily charge your customers. What's the customer benefit to using a random site to book tickets they could already book on something like Google Flights without a markup? Who handles support for rebookings, cancelations, etc.? It's bad enough having to go through an OTA with airlines/hotels when there's a problem; they tell you to call Expedia.

Travel agencies and the like would be using it. It's a lot better and cheaper than trying to get access to a GDS (which can be expensive, negotiating with a host agency, etc). I wanted to poke around at it myself but it seems like I'd need a $99/mo package package to use it? (I legitimately actually want pseudo-GDS access for my personal cohort so we can coordinate flights and conventions together as the logistics le…

Yes, that's correct, only available on a paid plan today. API still available on a PAYG basis though!

Re: Show HN: Duffel (YC S18) – A faster way to sell flights

#45

Post by stevedomin »

fideloper wrote: post #2

Who is the market for this? (This is way outside of industries I've worked in, genuinely curious!)

Banks, spend management platforms, hotels, concierge services, events & experiences marketplaces, employee reward providers, or any brand that has some kind of loyalty programs.

There are a few reasons why such companies might want to offer flights (and other travel services) through their own product. A non-exhaustive list:

- Retention: a credit card company or bank might offer points and wants customers to redeem these points for travel. An hotel might want to offer flights so that their customers can stay within their ecosystem rather than going to an OTA (which will offer million of other hotel products)

- Monetisation: capture extra margin points from selling these products

- UX: tighter integration between their own software and the travel booking piece, i.e a spend management platform layering approval flows, policies, on top of a booking engine

Re: Show HN: Duffel (YC S18) – A faster way to sell flights

#46

Post by stevedomin »

jaequery wrote: post #42
stevedomin wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Maybe it's one of these "if you have to ask, it's not for you" cases Kinda agree but also think we should do a better job making it explicit who the target is. Thanks for the feedback

Why not try clarify it for us here ?

Offered a few answers in comments below. Hope that helps clarify a bit.

https://news.ycombinator.com/edit?id=34819960

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34819449

Re: Show HN: Duffel (YC S18) – A faster way to sell flights

#47

Post by itissid »

I was under the impression that most people are price conscious and select the lowest cost option. This is not the target market for branding.

Now there are some(how many? I don't know, but its a small minority 10-20% if you look at Coach/First Business class ratio) that are not price sensitive, sure, but isn't it they case for them that they know well after some amount of flying what airline they like? I select between delta and southwest. I just open two tabs and look.

Then there is a question of whether airlines even offer new stuff frequently enough for people to change there preference? (I mean its not like they build the analog of a new iPhone every year for people to sit up and rethink their choices). The last innovation I heard was Delta's division of classes into Basic, Premium and Delta Comfort+ thingy quite a few years ago.

[1]https://thepointsguy.com/news/tpg-best-us-airlines-2022/

Re: Show HN: Duffel (YC S18) – A faster way to sell flights

#48

Post by mgfist »

crenwick wrote: post #5

YC: let’s finance companies to solve climate change Also YC: let’s make tools to encourage more flight travel

Solving air travel emissions will come from decarbonizing air travel, not from prohibition. Even if all flights were to be cut in half tomorrow it would have a rounding error effect on global emissions.

Re: Show HN: Duffel (YC S18) – A faster way to sell flights

#49

Post by eiso »

To me this seems like Stripe for Flights. No for a moment let's think beyond applications that would like you to book your flight through them (where Links seems super useful IMO) and start thinking about future voice assistants and copilot like products, Duffels API is the interface to book flights, how else do you offer this? No affiliation with the company, just genuinely positive about what they're doing.

Re: Show HN: Duffel (YC S18) – A faster way to sell flights

#50

Post by eiso »

To me this seems like Stripe for Flights. No for a moment let's think beyond applications that would like you to book your flight through them (where Links seems super useful IMO) and start thinking about future voice assistants and copilot like products, Duffels API is the interface to book flights, how else do you offer this? No affiliation with the company, just genuinely positive about what they're doing.

p.s. It looks like my HN account from almost a decade ago with the same username got deleted (had to recreate). How is this possible?

Post reply on HN