My journey to building Phindyr is improbable in retrospect. I’m an “adult onset” hunter. I didn’t grow up in a hunting family. In fact, I grew up vegetarian. (More to come on my experience becoming a hunter and carnivore in future episodes.) I also wasn’t a software engineer or entrepreneur, I’d spent about 25 years as a corporate lawyer and then an executive for a publicly traded fashion apparel retailer. But I had become a consumer of guided hunts and I was deeply dissatisfied with what the market offered me. Below is a brief story about my inspiration to build Phindyr, what I built, and why.
Appreciation meets frustration and leads to inspiration
From the late 2010s into the 2020s, virtually all of my hunting was through guided hunting trips. This just worked better with my busy schedule, allowed me to hunt game and in places that I otherwise couldn’t or wouldn’t, with a higher success rate. It was also a great way to spend time with my kids. I’d taken my oldest pheasant hunting when he turned 13 and then on his first big game hunt when he was 15. I wanted to take a more adventurous trip with him, so I started researching an Aoudad hunt in West Texas.
I found this process maddening. It was possible to find Aoudad outfitters on the internet, but finding anything like a rating or review was basically impossible. The best I found were typical internet forum threads, where one post essentially accuses a guide of being a near criminal, while others jump to the defense of the guide. Most often I found nothing at all.
It was also near impossible to find information about what to expect out of the experience. Is there a lodge? Where is it and what is it like? How many bedrooms are there? Do I have to share a room with other people? Are there pictures?
I did the best I could and chose to work with Mike Powell from All Seasons Guide Service. I spoke to Mike, we agreed on dates and prices, and then I ran into another giant pain in the ass when booking for a group: payment. Generally speaking, when you organize a trip, the outfitter is going to expect you to wrangle all of your friends and make sure they pay on time. And generally speaking, you’re going to be paying with a good old-fashioned paper check.
To be clear, I’ve never been stiffed by a guide. Everyone I’ve had the pleasure to work with has been a good, honest person. But that doesn’t make it comfortable to be sending a check to someone you’ve never met, in another state, for a large amount of money, six months or a year in advance of your trip. (Industry standard seems to be a 50% deposit immediately, followed by the remainder at least 30 days before your trip.) Add to that, I had to make sure that four other guys paid on time as well - and chasing your friends for money is never fun.
We worked through all that annoyance, booked a trip, and had a real adventure. My son and I had an amazing trip together. We both took incredible rams and had a blast doing it. If you’re interested, drop a comment below and maybe I’ll write up the story of that hunt.
Flying home, I reflected on the dichotomy of the trip. I had a great, successful hunt, due to a large extent to the hard work of my guide Bobby Warren (look him up, Plateau Adventures). Bobby spends over 200 days a year in the field, working hard scouting, planning, and guiding so that people like me can have a successful trip. In my experience, this is typical. Most guides are in the field essentially every minute they can be. This is what it takes to be able to run a successful hunt time after time.
But it doesn’t leave much, if any, time for all the other things that would make the pre-hunt experience better for the consumer. I don’t fault the hard working guides; who would have the time or energy to build fancy websites, take and curate pictures and videos, source unbiased reviews, or build payment rails when you spend virtually all of your time in places that often barely have cell coverage?
Nonetheless, when I thought about the process of hiring a guide, I felt that it sucked compared to what we have all grown accustomed to in other areas of our lives. Why was there no internet service that made this process easy for the consumer?
Perhaps it was a rush of blood to the head, but I decided, if that service didn’t exist, I would build it.
What is Phindyr and what does it offer?
After researching, talking to friends and mentors, and having second and third thoughts, I decided to dive in. The process was stressful and exciting at the same time. I dug deep into my network to find all the skills I didn’t have and would need to build my dream product. I met amazing developers, ultimately settled on a fantastic group (who became friends along the way), and started building. I reconnected with former colleagues, met new ones, and they helped design the beautiful front end you can see now at www.phindyr.com.
We did the best we could to build the tool that I wanted as a consumer. We built Phindyr (pronounced “finder”; the “ph” is a subtle nod to safari guides in Africa, who are called “Professional Hunters” or PHs) to help you find, research, book and pay for guided trips. We’re new and we have lots of expansion and improvement ideas. But today, Phindyr solves the core problems that irritated me as a customer.
First, it powers discovery.
Our guide onboarding team works daily to find, interview, and add guides and outfitters to Phindyr. This allows consumers to easily browse and search for the trips they want to take. We do the best we can to provide the information we would want as hunters, and to allow exceptional guides to easily and clearly show customers what sets them apart. One thing that always irritated me was a lack of pictures of the lodging, so we try hard to add pictures and descriptions of the lodges to our listings.
Second, Phindyr allows for unbiased ratings and reviews of the trips we offer.
Only verified purchasers can write a review, so you’re getting real information from real customers, not innuendo on internet forums.
Third, it powers messaging between customers and guides.
You can easily message a guide to ask questions about a trip, ask for custom options, and agree on dates to book a trip. Phindyr also lets you choose how to receive message alerts, so you can receive text messages, or just use email, depending on your preference.
Finally, Phindyr is the easiest way to book and pay for a guided group hunt.
I always hated chasing my friends for money, so Phindyr allows you to easily split the tab and send individual payment links to your friends. Phindyr will handle sending reminders also, so you don’t have to bug that one friend who always pays late. Phindyr checkout is powered by Stripe, the biggest and best internet payments processor, so your payments are safe and secure.
We’re really proud of what we’ve built, but we’re not done. As we grow, we plan to add more functionality to make life easier and business better for the guides we’ve always admired. Whether you’re a customer or a guide, if there’s a feature you’d love to see, we want to hear about it so we can continue to make Phindyr the best way to book a guided trip.
Phindyr is built and run by hunters for hunters. We hope you’ll check it out and book a hunt with your family and friends.
Happy hunting!
Ozzy