Good morning, Broadsheet readers! Sen. Elizabeth Warren and Rep. Lori Trahan want answers from OpenAI, single mothers are more likely to slip below the poverty line than single fathers or married parents, and a startup turns to women to modernize the travel industry. Have a restorative weekend!
– Travel trends. In 2021, Henley Vazquez noticed two trends. People were eager to travel as cities and borders opened back up, and women were still suffering the effects of the pandemic on their careers, whether they were still out of the workforce or struggling to return.
Vazquez was a two-time founder in the travel industry, and she came up with a business model that would attempt to capitalize on both of those shifts. She’s now the cofounder of Fora, a gig economy-style platform for travel agents. In a traditionally analog industry—where travel agents still sometimes took down customers’ credit card information on post-its—Fora built a tech platform with a travel-specific customer relationship management tool. The company raised a $13.5 million Series A round in 2022 from investors including Forerunner and Heartcore Capital.
It staffed that platform with a mostly female workforce of travel advisors, or people who book hotels and plan itineraries for travelers. Most of these advisors weren’t traditional travel agents. They’re the 20-somethings who were already planning trips and bachelorettes in their group chats, the retirees who specialize in empty-nester travel, and the women looking for extra income without heading back to an office. The traditional travel agency industry preferred to employ agents who booked high volumes of travel, while Fora seeks to capture the “long tail” of advisors who will book travel as a part-time gig, with a 70/30 commission split on the $1.5 million a day in travel the platform now books. Vazquez, a mother of three, argues that becoming a travel advisor can be the “new real estate” for women who want to try a new career in midlife.
Henley Vazquez, cofounder of Fora. Courtesy of Fora
The travel industry has already been thoroughly disrupted by players like Airbnb, but Vazquez argues that there’s lots of room to grow in the travel agent space; only 8% of hotels worldwide are booked by travel agents and there’s more social media content about travel than ever. “It’s a human relationship kind of industry,” she says. “Where the industry has gone wrong is assuming, ‘I’m fine, I’ll just filter through all this stuff online.’”
Four years after the beginning of the pandemic, women are back in the workforce in full force. But the boom in travel hasn’t stopped. Travelers are booking wellness and adventure travel and seeking help from travel advisors to find more personal alternatives to, say, the Instagram-ready but crowded Amalfi Coast. “My goal is to raise the profile of this industry,” Vazquez says, “for all of us.”
Emma Hinchliffe
emma.hinchliffe@fortune.com
The Broadsheet is Fortune’s newsletter for and about the world’s most powerful women. Today’s edition was curated by Nina Ajemian. Subscribe here.
ALSO IN THE HEADLINES
– Open to debate. Presidential candidates Donald Trump and Kamala Harris agreed to a debate set for Sept. 10 on ABC. Harris told reporters that she’s open to additional debates and she “hope[s] he shows up” for the Sept. 10 debate. CNN
– Safety concerns. Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) and Rep. Lori Trahan (D-Mass.) want answers from OpenAI: How does the company deal with whistleblowers and safety reviews? “We write with concern regarding reports that OpenAI ‘is putting a priority on profits and growth’ while ‘prevent[ing] workers from voicing their concerns about [its] technology,’” they wrote in a letter shared with The Verge.
– A single mom who works two jobs. New research shows that single mothers are more likely to slip below the poverty line than single fathers or married parents, as more women work low-paying jobs. There are around 7.3 million single moms in the U.S.; 76% of them work full time and earn a median income of $40,000, while single dads’ medium income is $57,000 and married mom’s was $60,000. The 19th
– Welcome, why?! Former Netflix and Clubhouse employees Maya Watson and Lexi Nisita are the cofounders of why?!, a new social app that combines messaging, networking, and dating services. The app, which raised $1.65 million in pre-seed funding, will launch to the public this fall. TechCrunch
– Stumbling down. Shares of Bumble, the online dating and networking app with chief executive officer Lidiane Jones, have dropped 29%, the largest percentage drop in the company’s history. Bumble has adjusted its revenue projections for the year, now expecting 1% to 2% growth, rather than 8% to 11%. Wall Street Journal
MOVERS AND SHAKERS
Thorne, a supplement brand, hired Mary Beech as chief growth officer. Most recently, Beech was chief marketing and transformation officer at Scholastic. She has also held senior positions at Sarah Flint, Kate Spade, and Disney.
Panorama Education, an education technology company, appointed Catherine Chang as chief financial officer. Previously, Chang was chief financial officer at BlueVoyant.
Blackline Safety, a connected safety technology company, appointed Robin Kooyman as chief financial officer. Most recently, Kooyman was chief executive officer of Charger Ready Properties.
ON MY RADAR
Nancy Pelosi’s art of power New Yorker
A Chinese woman sued to freeze her eggs. She lost New York Times
Bad news for high-performing women: You’re more likely to receive unhelpful feedback Fortune
PARTING WORDS
“I’m always extremely flattered to be grouped in with the other women and girls who I’ve idolized and looked up to who came from that, but I feel very distant from it.”
— Singer Sabrina Carpenter on growing up and away from her Disney background
Fora Travel recruits women as gig economy travel agents
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