Safara, a NYC-based hotel booking platform that curates the world’s best hotels and rewards travelers with cashback on every booking, acquired Skipper, a software company empowering independent hotels with seamless shopping and checkout experiences.
Alongside the acquisition, Safara also raised additional funding from defy.vc, Sequoia Capital, Thayer Ventures, and H20, bringing total funding to-date to $14M.
The company intends to use the funds to further accelerate its growth and innovation.
Founded by former Resy executives Doug Schuessler and Cody Rose, Safara blends data aggregation and community-sourced recommendations to provide users with a curated booking experience. The company also pairs this with a loyalty program that starts at 2.5% cashback and scales all the way up to 10% cashback to use towards your next trip. Safara currently has 1M+ bookable properties globally in the marketplace app in addition to key boutique hotel groups like Ace Hotels, Aparium Hotel Group, Bridgeton, and Kirkwood Collection leveraging their online reservations SaaS solution.
Skipper provides software to power the shopping & checkout experience on hotels’ websites. Existing hotel customers include top boutiques, like Ace Hotels, Aparium, Inness, Troutbeck, Marram, The Ameswell, Dawn Ranch, Kirkwood Collection, and more. Skipper was founded by Jason Shames, Dane Bratz, and Cole Maritz.
The integration of Skipper’s technology will enable Safara to deliver a differentiated platform already driving $100M+ in annualized gross merchandising volume. Skipper founders Jason Shames and Dane Bratz will be joining Safara.
FinSMEs
23/12/2024