Introducing Location Finder: Easily find flights and destinations for your next retreat

When it comes to hosting retreats for distributed teams, you can't escape the fact that employees are based in a wide range of locations.

Booking flights and getting the whole team together in one spot can be a huge headache. The flight search tools like Google Flights and Kayak are optimized for individuals not groups.

We decided to make this process easier by developing a new, free tool called Location Finder.

What is Location Finder?

Example: Globally distributed company organizes an All-Hands Meeting

Location Finder - search flights

Firstly, we put all the data for the teams into the Location Finder tool. Notice that the tool has three fields by default, so we add one more field by using the + button in the right corner. Once we have all data inserted we hit Search.

Location Finder - search flight results

The best destination for this company's all-hands meeting in terms of average travel time is Amsterdam. Most of the flights to Amsterdam are direct, Shanghai employees must use one transfer. Estimated flight costs are $59, 730. This number is dependant on the airlines selected and thus is not 100% precise, but it gives an idea of the budget (+/- 15%).

Furthermore, there are a few important factors to consider when evaluating the results. The 6th result with $51, 620 seems to have the lowest estimated costs. Yet, you wouldn't want to inconvenience your team members with 1 more hour of average travel time and more layovers for a small saving to your budget.

The 2nd best destination as for the flight costs is interesting - Madrid. To look at it closer, click on the row of Madrid:

Location Finder - search flight results

As you can see in the details of the Madrid destination, this option has the same number of stops as Amsterdam. The biggest difference is that the flight between Berlin and Amsterdam (01:30) is much shorter than the flight betwen Berlin and Madrid (03:09). If you consider the flight time for Berlin-Madrid still acceptable, you can pick Madrid for your all-hands meeting and save some budget.

Our tip is to keep alternatives in mind. For instance, there is a train between Barcelona and Madrid which takes 03:15. If it's cheaper than a flight, it may be more comfortable to take a train as it removes the added time of going to the airport and waiting there.

Let’s look at the final option - Barcelona.

Location Finder - search flight results

Barcelona is an interesting destination. Your company has an office there, and might have access to a space that can host 250 people for an all-hands meeting. As you can see, 40 employees don't need to travel as they're already in Barcelona. So it's only the others that now have to reach the office too.

When you have a closer look at this result, you can see 1 stop on the flight route Berlin-Barcelona. It can be caused by the dates (season, availability of direct flights, or the number of seats). The team is too big so it should be booked further in advance. If you're able to find the direct flight, it will lower the travel time significantly as well as average layovers.

To do this, click on the text “70x BER - BCN” in the destination detail, and play with the dates to fix your problem with the layover:

Kiwi.com - search flights

Click on the Search link in the breadcrumb navigation to customize this flight.

How does Location Finder sort its results?

We have considered many criteria in our sorting algorithm. After much trial and error we picked average travel time as the most important, followed by average stops and estimated flight costs.

When the company organizes this retreat, it's being organized in a certain timeframe and within a certain budget. The average travel time per person means total flight time of all people divided by the number of people. It's correlated to the average stops per person, as layover flights tend to have higher flight times. The connection to the price of the flight is weaker, and is included to give an idea while reviewing the results.

Our flight search tool works as ‘advisor’ and the flight costs aren’t the most important thing to consider. We decided to keep it simple and make all the suggested flights one-way with the date 9 days from the flight search.

Conclusion

Location Finder is a free tool for evaluating flights to advise the optimal city to meet with your team. Its algorithm uses the flight data from more than 500 airlines, and reflects the fastest and most comfortable options for the team as a whole.

All the connections are analyzed within a few seconds resulting in the suggested destinations. They are sorted by average travel time, lowest number of layovers and estimated price. We recommend to consider more than the first destination in the results and decide according to costs and travel time combined. Good luck!

Try Location Finder for yourself, let us know what you think, and feel free to share it with others if you find it useful.

Location Finder: Flights app for teams - Find the optimal location to meet with your remote team | Product Hunt Embed
No items found.
No items found.
No items found.
No items found.
No items found.
budget retreat spreadsheet

Retreat Budget Spreadsheet

Are you organising a company retreat and want to make sure you have all the costs under the control?

Get a copy of our free Budget Calculator spreadsheet.

Get a copy

Interviews with more “newly-remote” companies:

Skift’s Insights and Experiences About Switching to Remote Work

Skift’s Insights and Experiences About Switching to Remote Work

During these times, many companies are switching to remote work. You may have heard that large companies, like Twitter, Shopify, and Slack are doing so, but we’re also seeing this shift with smaller companies, startups, and digital agencies as well. Perhaps this transition was already in the pipeline, or maybe COVID-19 was the catalyst. Either…

CPJ’s journey into remote work

CPJ’s journey into remote work

During these times, many companies are switching to remote work. You may have heard that large companies, like Twitter, Shopify, and Slack are doing so, but we’re also seeing this shift with smaller companies, startups, and digital agencies as well. Perhaps this transition was already in the pipeline, or maybe COVID-19 was the catalyst. Either…

From the office to remote: Real.Digital chooses quality over the location

From the office to remote: Real.Digital chooses quality over the location

Around mid-August of this year Real.Digital announced that they will be operating as a remote first company from now on.They might not be affected by the COVID-19 in economic terms, but the decision to shift their work practices was still a significant one. Fortunately, they’re viewing it as a great opportunity to open up their talent pool to people from all over the world!

How digital product studio Pixelmatters transformed from office to remote

How digital product studio Pixelmatters transformed from office to remote

By now, you’ve probably heard the news that large companies like Twitter, Shopify and Slack are “going remote”. And recently, we’re hearing more and more stories about smaller companies, startups, and digital agencies doing the same. What were their motivations? What challenges do they face during this transition? How do they see their future? We…

FREE COURSE

How to plan your first company retreat

Get for free

With knowledge collected from:

free course partners logos

free course

How to plan your first company retreat

With knowledge collected from:
surfoffice in press logossurfoffice in press logos

Organize your next company retreat with Surf Office

500+ retreats organized ● 10 years of experience ● 110+ retreat locations
Get a quote