When's the last time you took a vacation day? How about a vacation week? After graduating, three Northeastern alumni realized many working professionals struggle to take off earned time for vacation.
To combat this, Kevin Corliss, DMSB'16, Douglas Franklin, DMSB/E'16, and Christopher Kenyon, CCIS'17, created Treehoppr, an online platform that tracks accrued time off, has a savings account feature, and travel information.
“We want to help people eliminate these barriers to travel,” Corliss said. “What are the things you always hear when you ask people about traveling? They don't have the time, the money, or the know-how when it comes to a foreign country. We want to help people solve all those issues.”
Treehoppr originated as an idea during Corliss' marketing capstone class at the D'Amore-McKim School of Business. He realized he was onto something when he explained his idea to his French friends on campus.
“They just didn't even understand the problem; this is a uniquely American thing that we don't use our paid time off,” he said.
Not taking time off can be bad for employee health, happiness, and productivity. According to jobs and recruiting site Glassdoor, Americans who have paid time off generally only use half of it. Treehoppr aims to fix these issues.
Employers and employees both use the platform—employees can set up a travel fund and plan their trip all in the same place, and employers can opt to offer a savings match if they want to.
The three are still testing the product, but they do have a handful of small businesses on board, with plans to expand into bigger businesses in the future.