A Tampa-based startup specializing in wellness-focused travel has closed a $3.3 million seed round led by Tampa Bay Lightning owner and startup supporter Jeff Vinik.
Vacayou, which launched earlier this year, announced the funding Tuesday morning. Relevance Ventures, a Nashville-based venture firm, also participated in the round, along with other angel investors.
"Quite honestly, I'm very excited — this has been building for a year and a half for me," Vacayou founder and CEO Muirgheal Montecalvo said.
Vinik was introduced to Vacayou through innovation hub Embarc Collective. The company is a member of the hub, and Vinik is a financial supporter of Embarc Collective.
"We’re about to see a boom in travel, and Vacayou is perfectly positioned to serve the growing population of travelers interested in health and wellness," Vinik said in a statement. "We’re excited to be part of the team serving this important segment."
The funding tops off a whirlwind year for Montecalvo. Her company was originally slated to launch in 2020 before the novel coronavirus halted travel entirely.
"Pre-Covid, we were building something a lot of people in the U.S. didn’t understand," she said. "In Europe, wellness travel was very much a thing. Active [travel] is considered part of wellness [travel], and we believe wellness is what you believe — it could be a spa, could be hiking."
But now, the industry is coming back in a big way. Airports are seeing record-breaking months of travel, and Montecalvo said the wellness and active travel industry specifically is thriving after a year of lockdown.
"What's interesting is many more people realize the importance of staying active and well," she said. "I couldn’t have asked for better timing. With wellness and active travel, people want to get out and get a mental reset."
The company works with several properties after vetting each one to make an easy-to-use site pairing their technology with a concierge team.
"One of the difficulties was searching for and finding these retreats, and then figuring out if they were truly good retreats," Montecalvo said. "This is an, 'I'm looking for an experience, something different to do' thing, and our goal is to bring those experiences to you."
The company has more than one dozen full-time employees as of now and expects to close another funding round by the end of the year for an undisclosed amount.
"I'm hoping we can grow it here and be very successful based here," she said. "There are a lot of people coming here and bringing opportunities."
