Lifestyles are shifting. Travel has become more accessible, and millennials have leaned into making it a genuine priority — not just more often, but more intentionally. Experiences over aesthetics. Depth over distance.

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What I noticed, as someone who has spent years in and around the travel industry, is that a new kind of operator has risen to meet this demand: small, focused, building trips with a genuine point of view. Most of them rely on word of mouth to fill their departures. Paper Trails makes it a little easier for the right traveler to find the right trip.

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I spent five years in finance in New York before realizing it wasn't the life I wanted. I quit, bought a one-way ticket to South America, and spent a year exploring the Andes before finding my way into the travel industry — eventually working for a luxury tour operator in Buenos Aires, organizing trips across Europe and Latin America. I learned a lot about what makes a trip work, and what travelers are actually paying for when they invest in a well-designed journey.

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When I left in 2025, I wanted to build something I'd have wanted to find myself. Not a mass marketplace — those already exist, with hundreds of operators and thousands of itineraries. Something more like a trusted edit. A smaller, curated collection of operators who do things properly, in one place, so you don't have to go hunting.