A couple of weeks ago, we wrote about social travel site Stay.com‘s expansion. After months of retooling, the user-built travel guide site has relaunched and we have had a chance to play the virtual flâneur.
Among other changes, Stay.com has struck deals with TripAdvisor, TopTable and OpenTable. They are planning on adding in more such information as they go forward.
Users of Stay.com pull elements such as hotels, restaurants, bars, shopping, museums and gardens together with a click, to create a guide crafted to their needs, tastes and destinations. It can be consulted on computer or smart phone, or printed out as a pocket-sized .pdf. Users can broadcast their itinerary or parts of it to friends via Facebook and Twitter. Each guide that gets created adds to the library of itineraries available to users.
Stay.com’s goal, according to its publicist and materials, was to make a very intuitive interface for travelers and they seem to have done that. The cities, lodging, bars and so on, are arranged hierarchically from most likely to be needed to possibly useful. The ability to both read it online and to print it out serves those who either wish to untether or who find electronics less useful on their trick (not enough power or too many pickpockets, for instance).
For some types of sites, the more dazzling they are, the more enjoyable. This is not necessarily the case with travel. You’re already traveling, after all. Oh, the sights you’ll see – they’re more important than the sites. In that respect, the pleasant but clean design, in service of the travel, is appealing.
Additional features Stay.com plans to roll out include user-added venues and places, third-party sharing widgets, full mobile integration and geolocation and video guides.
