Y2Z Travel

How we replaced 7+ disconnected tools and 90 days of research with a 60 second* AI-powered trip planner, and found product-market fit in a $4 billion industry.

Role

Founding Product Designer

Duration

8 months

Team

1 Designer · 2 Engineers · CEO

Platform

PWA

Role

Founding Product Designer

Team

1 Designer · 2 Engineers · CEO

Duration

8 months

Platform

PWA

Results

Reduction in time-to-value

Reduction in
time-to-value

Net Promoter Score
surveyed across 30,000* launch users

Cut in API cost

Onboarding completion

As Founding Product Designer, I partnered with the CEO on the 0 to 1 roadmap, first field interview to GTM strategy, balancing growth against bootstrapped constraints.

Overview

Y2Z Travel is a bootstrapped AI travel planning platform built to help travellers research, personalise, plan and collaborate on trips in real time. We replaced the exhausting, multi-week research burden of modern travel planning, spread across 7+ disconnected tools, with one intelligent product that plans and creates an itinerary the way a great travel agent, or an experienced traveler would, asking the right questions, sequencing the logic, and generating highly customisable, personalised itineraries instantly

♥️

Built by travelers, for travelers.

Background

Y2Z was born from frustration. The founder and I both traveled frequently and found that planning a trip felt like a second job, cycling through multiple apps for ideas, feasibility, and logistics, still second-guessing every turn.

Every piece of the trip, ideas, notes, tickets, expenses, lived in a different app. What we were missing was traceability, notes tied to a place, research tied to a day, context we could track without losing it or hunting across a dozen tools.

We suspected the setup was bad. The data told us it was worse. A single day of trip planning involved over 220 opens of travel-related apps and 206 phone unlocks, constant context-switching across a dozen apps that exposed the real gap.

We researched what tools people currently use to plan journeys, and tried the fixes ourselves - Stippl, Notion and our own Sheets hack. Every option forced the same trade. Usability or flexibility, never both. Stippl sat closest to usable, Notion won on customisation, our Sheets hack landed in neither. No tool occupied the zone we needed, the Ideal Zone.

This began with personal frustration. We followed with 50+ traveler interviews, 30+ industry reports, and agents at SOTC and Thomas Cook. Finding: 73% felt no platform delivered vibe and logistics together, so they trusted none.

Research & Discovery

To test whether this friction was universal, we built a multi-tiered discovery framework, combining grassroots community analysis with global macro data to isolate exactly where consumer intent turns into systemic friction.

After the analysis, we had an enormous set of data points. It was surprising to see this turn out to be a significant issue across the industry, so we prioritized carefully around what people actually needed.

The ideal traveler was identified largely through credible players positioned to help open capital markets, while also pointing us toward travelers who represented genuine product-market fit.

The ideal traveler was identified largely through credible players positioned to help open capital markets, while also pointing us toward travelers who represented genuine product-market fit.

The ideal traveler was identified largely through credible players positioned to help open capital markets, while also pointing us toward travelers who represented genuine product-market fit.

Prioritizing what to solve came down to two parameters: alignment with community need and business opportunity. The core problem got solved first, additional features followed in later stages.

Prioritizing what to solve came down to two parameters: alignment with community need and business opportunity. The core problem got solved first, additional features followed in later stages.

Prioritizing what to solve came down to two parameters: alignment with community need and business opportunity. The core problem got solved first, additional features followed in later stages.

Field research, synthesis, and interviews surfaced more friction than expected. We mapped it into a sunburst, clustering insights by relevance and frequency to trace each one back to its root.

The Challenge

After going through the multi-tiered framework, we had enough pointers to act. But with both qualitative and quantitative data in hand, it was time to pick the challenges that would solve our tooling needs and the traveler's top issues at once.

The core reasons behind the problems were traced using the available data sets collected before, surfacing the most critical issues by aggregating them, with the highest-scoring ones pointing to our priority to solve.

Here's a version folding that in:

As a team, we ran affinity mapping to understand and pair the data, helping us surface the most critical problems alongside the initial direction, which collectively shaped the HMW questions shown below.

Challenge 1

How might we collapse 90 days of fragmented research into a planning experience that generates a usable and trustworthy itinerary instantly ?

Challenge 2

How might we synthesise a scattered stack of Maps, Weather, Notes, and Document Attachments into a single, Unified "One-View" Touchpoint that keeps the entire journey organised and shareable?

Challenge 3

How might we replace generic, one-size-fits-all itineraries with a planning experience that understands a traveler's unique preferences, pace, and style from the very first interaction?

Process

From the research uncovered during the Challenge phase, it was clear the three problems had to be solved sequentially.

Across Accenture, Amex, Infosys and WEF reports, AI consistently surfaced as one of the most prominent solutions for travel planning and personalisation. It became the default technology we chose to experiment with for what we'd set out to solve.

#c1

To solve the 90-day fragmentation problem, AI was the clear answer. The reports agreed: businesses across the industry were expected to build generative AI into their offerings given the scale of demand.

We planned to build AI as our foundational model long-term, but for the MVP, we used a third-party API from OpenAI, tuning prompts to power the system in the early stage.

Challenge 1

#C2

Mapping the interface, we explored usable formats, staying close to the core needs around maps and travel unity. We tested multiple options, then selected the direction based on what travelers actually quoted during interviews.

Attachments were considered by default, with similar information grouped together in the process.

Challenge 2

#C3

Personalisation needed a lot of data, hard to get upfront. The turnaround: collect it through onboarding, before generation even starts. Among the options explored, this worked best, a smoother UX and better input for the AI to build the itinerary around.

Challenge 3

Solution

Expand beyond Discord with a space built for Midjourney community collaboration.

When Midjourney approached us, they already had a bbrowser experience but needed a dedicated space for users to connect, share, and learn.

A delightful new design. Liquid Glass reflects and refracts what’s beneath it in real time, dynamically adapting to your content across apps and devices.

Coming to: iPhone, iPad, Mac, Apple Watch, Apple TV 4K

A more vibrant Lock Screen. The time transforms based on your photo wallpaper and notifications, keeping your subject in view. When you move your device, your photo comes to life with a new 3D effect.

Coming to: iPhone, iPad

Updated app icons. Personalize your Home Screen or Dock with updated light or dark appearances, new color-tinted icons, or a stunning clear look.

Coming to: iPhone, iPad, Mac

Dynamic controls. Across apps, Liquid Glass controls reflect and refract their surroundings and fluidly morph to bring more focus to your content.

Coming to: iPhone, iPad, Mac, Apple Watch

Everyday apps, elevated. From Camera and Photos to Safari and FaceTime, your go-to apps feel fresh and expressive. And moving across apps and devices feels more harmonious than ever.

Coming to: iPhone, iPad, Mac, Apple Watch, Apple TV 4K

A delightful new design. Liquid Glass reflects and refracts what’s beneath it in real time, dynamically adapting to your content across apps and devices.

Coming to: iPhone, iPad, Mac, Apple Watch, Apple TV 4K

Coming to: iPhone, iPad

Updated app icons. Personalize your Home Screen or Dock with updated light or dark appearances, new color-tinted icons, or a stunning clear look.

Coming to: iPhone, iPad, Mac

Dynamic controls. Across apps, Liquid Glass controls reflect and refract their surroundings and fluidly morph to bring more focus to your content.

Coming to: iPhone, iPad, Mac, Apple Watch

Everyday apps, elevated. From Camera and Photos to Safari and FaceTime, your go-to apps feel fresh and expressive. And moving across apps and devices feels more harmonious than ever.

Coming to: iPhone, iPad, Mac, Apple Watch, Apple TV 4K

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CLARA