The One Travel Planner You Don’t Want to Miss Out On

When you think about traveling, you can’t wait for all the exciting and fun things to come.  Just when you think you’re ready, you’ll get bombarded with all the responsibilities that follow along.  Perhaps you may even find yourself always short on time to prepare for your next travel destination. How can you prevent this from ever happening again?  One possible solution is to check out Wanderium. 

What is Wanderium?

Wanderium, a business founded by Jono Lee, is essentially the travel planner that covers all your travel concerns and important things you might forget.  It gathers all the necessary information to prevent you from having to search through multiple resources. Wanderium wants to ensure travelers' trips that are hassle-free from the time before takeoff through the time after landing.  This company believes in three key terms which are quality, brevity, and responsibility. To expound respectively, they focus on quality over quantity, concise information, and environmentally friendly ways of travel. 

Inspiration for Wanderium

         Jono Lee designed and developed Wanderium in its entirety.  Lee stated, “Studies show travelers visit over 38 cities and spend over 15 hours planning for a trip.”  He is closely familiar with this issue as he has traveled and lived in 25 countries through the years of 2016 to 2018.  In order to confirm that this was an actual problem that other people experience, he conducted more than 20 user interviews with frequent travelers to better understand their travel routines, difficulties they faced, and how they would come to a solution for those difficulties. 

         For Wanderium’s design, Lee drew inspiration from Instagram.  Instagram has the target market of “tech-savvy millennials” which influenced his decision to use lighter colors in the scheme for a more inviting feeling.  Additionally, he found inspiration through popular D2C brands including Casper, Everlane, and Outdoor Voices as well.

Beginning Steps

         There are two plans offered on Wanderium’s site: the free plan which is made for occasional travelers (costing $15 per planned trip after the one first free planned trip per year), and the premium plan (costing $60 per year) which is made for the frequent travelers.  While it’s not necessary to sign up, it is more helpful to have all your personalized data saved which will thus give you more handy information. Signing up is a swift process. You’ll enter basic information such as your name, nationality, home city, passport expiration, birthday, gender, and any languages you may know.  From there, you’ll probably have received a confirmation email for your account which is one of their many appealing features; they don’t dillydally with responses! 

How it Works

         Wanderium will provide you with the obvious information as well as those often forgotten pieces of key travel facts and responsibilities.  On their website, you’ll be able to search for a country in the search box which will then direct you to the core of Wanderium. It features a synopsis of the travel destination you chose, along with topics including visitor requirements (for those from the United States or Canada), public safety, currency, infrastructure (wall sockets and internet speed), culture, and transportation.  At the bottom of the page is a map of the country included. If that isn’t enough, to further assist in your travel planning, as you’re signed in your account, you’ll be able to input your travel period which will then give you even more information, suggestions, and reminders including weather predictions, time zone, the geography of the city, things to do, etc. 

 

 

Pros

It is refreshing to come across resources that don’t lead to a waste of time.  Have you ever looked up the definition of a vocabulary word, only to find yourself to look for the definition of a word that was used in the definition of the vocabulary word you were initially trying to find its definition of?  We’re glad to say Wanderium is far from that. Here are some pros of Wanderium:

• Easy site navigation allows for a seamless experience.
• There is data on 250 countries and over 500 cities (Don’t worry about trying to travel to Antarctica!)
• Graphics and information are modern and up to date.
• Ability to customize checklists and reminders or use ones that are prefilled.
• Personalized city guides
• Important local warnings and tips (dress code, foreigner-friendly, tax-free shopping)
• Gear and product recommendations with explanations
• Your information is safe and secure and won’t be used for other purposes.
• Honest opinions (no clickbait sites that depend on advertisements)

 

Cons

With every business, there is always room for improvement. Since Wanderium is quite new and was established as of 2019, there are a few things they can improve upon. 

• Uncertainty of when flight notifications, their “Deal Club”, and important flight/lodging reservations will be released. We hope to see them clarify what exactly does the Deal Club entail to allow us to decide if it's worth it or not. 
• Currently, Wanderium is only available to US and Canadian citizens. Not worldwide yet but they did mention they will expand to other countries in 2021.
• A lot of information to scroll through (We know it’s important information but perhaps they could be reorganized so that it doesn’t feel like endless back and forth scrolling and losing track of where you last left off.)
• Mobile app compatibility. Wanderium plans to have native iOS and Android apps towards early 2020.
• Inability to invite others to your planned trips (Collaborating to plan a trip and simultaneously viewing it from multiple devices would be a nice feature to add.)

UPDATE: We've spoken with Wanderium and they mentioned that they plan to add automatic flight and hotel reservation imports, as well as further incorporating a Deals Club like I had talked to you about. We're also happy to announce that UrbanCred will also now be apart of the Deals Club that was mentioned earlier. 

Wanderium is a fundamental resource that more people should know about.  It’s like a mobile travel encyclopedia at the palm of your heads (as long as you have a stable wifi/data connection.)  We hope to have inspired you to use Wanderium and other businesses alike for productivity and functionality purposes. Wanderium immensely appreciates its positive feedback and continues to help out others while striving to reach all of their goals for their success as a new business filled with empowering potential.

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Will you be using Wanderium for your next trip? If so, take a look here at https://www.wanderium.com/. Want to support? Be sure to sign up for their premium subscription and get an exclusive discount with a number of brands including UrbanCred!