#localeur

Each year, I lead my team on a retreat over a few days to have fun, plan the future and collaborate (particularly since we often work remotely in various cities). Last year, we went to the Bay Area and ate great food, visited Pixar’s headquarters and more. The year previous we visited Washington, D.C. where we went on a local scavenger hunt, hosted a party with locals and hiked Great Falls Park. This year, we traveled to Denver for some high-altitude thinking. Through it all, we made our way around town with car2go, where we snagged a two-day package for less than $190 and found convenient parking all over the city and even at Red Rocks where we took in nature, as the locals do.

From left: Larry (brand and partnerships), Cate (content), Joah (CEO), Matt (UX design), Chase (engineering)

Our Senior UX Designer Matt gazes out at Downtown Denver from Red Rocks.

Our Director of Content Cate was happy about the close parking at Red Rocks.

Larry, usually behind the camera, reflected on finishing his first year at Localeur.

Next time, we’ll have to catch a show at Red Rocks, too! Definitely.

Cate and I did manage to get in a quality run though. The other guys watched.

Marcos Coal-Fired Pizza was an excellent first meal in the city. A couple of us earned the calories.

Tacos, Tequila and Whiskey is the actual name of this spot. Delicious.

While everyone immediately thinks of Snooze and jumps into an hour-long wait, we used Localeur to find Syrup and it’s an equally awesome, local brunch spot.

We had some fairly cold weather, but we had a sweet ride keeping us warm.

We hit up 1Up for some classic arcade games, from Pac-Man to NBA Jam.

That’s right, the time has finally come to introduce our new and improved Android app. Download the app for free today on Google Play and please make sure to leave us a review sharing your experience and any feedback! We hope you enjoy using our app to #experiencelocal in 60+ cities around the world. Here’s a preview of what you can expect!

OK, so a couple weeks ago, I wrote about choosing to live carlessly in Austin. On a recent trip to Toronto, I got many of the same perks I get from being a car2go user in another one of the best cities in North America (if not the world). From pizza and pasta at Terroni on Price Street to beers at Bandit Brewery, the city and the recommendations from our locals in Toronto did not disappoint. Here are a few pics I was able to snag while hopping from one Localeur-recommended spot to another (with an assist from this car2go Mercedes-Benz CLA coupe).

This is me trying to be artsy in the Royal Museum of Ontario. How’d I do?

The aforementioned Mercedes-Benz CLA coupe. I could def get used to this.

Took the car2go for a spin to catch some views (Drake reference) at Scarborough Bluffs. Shout out to Jac-lyn. 

Also checked out the sights at Edwards Garden (above and below). This place was super chill and I could see it being a good date spot.

Then, of course, I figured why the hell not drive down to Niagara Falls (below). Sure, it’s touristy, but it’s still mighty impressive.

Launched March 1, 2013, with 15 of my friends in Austin, Texas, contributing recommendations on where to find breakfast tacos and see shows during SXSW and now expanded globally to 60+ cities and counting including Australia, Canada, Spain, London, Mexico City, Hong Kong, Amsterdam and 50 major US cities. We didn’t even have an app when we launched!

Still, we've done this without a single institutional VC firm, with just one full-time engineer, one full-time UX designer, a 5-person team, a stellar group of angel investors, some great partners like JetBlue, and a community of locals who truly know where to eat, drink and play, and they're willing to share it with you all not because you're tourists who will overrun their favorite local spots but because our community is authentic, curated, credible and high quality. There is trust.

Please take a moment to download our new iPhone app today (it's free). Email me directly at [email protected] with any feedback or feel free to leave a review in the App Store! - Joah

P.S. We are adding more functionality to “Nearby” very soon, then will launch Android within a couple weeks followed by major updates on Profiles and Trips so stay tuned!

You may remember that in spring of 2016, I embarked on a cross-country, 35-city roadtrip to meet with locals and local business owners all over America. It was an exceptional experience and led to some huge insights and breakthroughs for Localeur. Funny thing is, being in a car for nearly 20,000 miles (solo for the majority of it), for 42 days left me feeling a bit differently about car ownership in Austin. Upon my return, I immediately began making plans to sell my car and ultimately did so a little over a year ago. My FJ Cruiser, Uncle Phil, will forever have a place in my heart.

But the last year, not being a car owner, has been exceptional. I’ve used Lyft plenty. I’ve walked much more than ever before here in Texas, which takes me back to my days living and working in D.C. when walking was my preferred method of getting around. But the true life-saver has been car2go.

In March of this year, during SXSW, we were able to work with car2go and I introduced the company to some of my friends like drummer-turned-college lecturer Dorian (bottom) and co-workers like our director of engineering, Chase (top), who also embraced the car-sharing phenomena. Having car2go’s North America headquarters be based here in Austin, has made it that much easier to embrace the local company and their Smart cars, but I’ll be real...things go even sweeter when they announced they’d start rolling out Mercedes-Benz vehicles into the fleet this year, too. [More on that another time.]

Today, I’ve helped get Localeurs all over North America experience car2go including locals in Columbus (James), Vancouver (Marta), D.C. (Leigh), Portland (Yume) and Austin (Vicky), but honestly I don’t care if anyone else loves car2go as much as I do (even though they should) because I know why I love it.

Being carless from an ownership-standpoint in a city like Austin where car is king and driving is a part of life here as a local would be utterly and completely impossible without car2go. I’ve used it to run simple errands like going to the post office, shopping at some of my favorite spots (see above @ Passport Vintage) or meeting up with friends across town for a book club discussion, and that’s why I’m excited to use this space to share more going in the coming weeks and months about my personal experience with their cars (been riding around in the Mercedes-Benz GLA a lot lately) along with sharing the experiences of some of our Localeurs with their cars across North America, too! Stay tuned and drive safe!

I may be the person standing there next to Apple CEO Tim Cook. I may be the person giving a demo of our iPhone app to the leader of the most valuable company in the world. I may be the founder and CEO of Localeur.

But this moment, which took place this morning in Austin around 9:45 a.m. Central, is a moment that belongs to my entire team and also includes our advisers, our investors and - most importantly - our community of locals who are truly passionate about helping travelers #experiencelocal.

Major thanks to the entire team at Capital Factory who helped put on a phenomenal event. And connected me to Mr. Cook!

Photos by Ben Porter Photography.