We get this question a lot. Most people are asking about the name. But, the name is actually what we stand for. The name is the core of who we are and what we do. So, we thought we’d break it down a bit:

Our Vision

Travel is so freeing. It opens up our minds. It reinvigorates us and awakens all our senses. We seek to explore authentic, new, and unique experiences. Moreover, when we travel, we support local economies. Our vision is to encourage more of this. Our vision is…

A world where people can roam freely, sharing the best of their cultures, and creating memorable experiences.

Our Mission

While travel is beautiful, it is one of the biggest discretionary spending decisions most people have to make. Finding the right accommodations, the right tour guides, the right way to stay, can be challenging amidst all the noise. We believe it should be different. Therefore, our mission is…

To create a platform that helps people find memorable places to stay and removes costs as a barrier to exploration so that they can give back to local economies.

Our Core Values

As the48team, we act with the following internal values to bring our mission to life:

Build empathy through engagement.

Trust through integrity.

Resilience through setbacks.

Creativity through everything else.

By building empathy through engagement, we mean that we care about getting to know our customers and their challenges so that we help them remove those challenges. But, it also means that we care about having a good relationship with our partners, and with each other as we work together on the48dots team.

Trust through integrity means two things to us: that we honor our word and that we vet other customers to make sure they honor theirs to keep the48dots ecosystem safe.

Resilience through setbacks also means a few things for us. We are action-oriented and so this value means we will push through to make good if anything goes wrong. Second, this value is just a way of operating internally. Building a new company is hard. As a team, sometimes we have good days, and sometimes we have bad days. But, we build tough skin and remember our mission to keep us moving on.

Lastly, creativity through everything else. We care about opening our minds, imagining, dreaming, and trying new things. Creativity means different things to everyone, but for all of us, when we are pushed to think outside our own personal lines, we get that euphoric kick that helps us make a way for the seemingly impossible.

So, what does ‘the48dots’ stand for?

Literally, it’s the 48 dots in the Morse Code translation of the first part of our vision statement: A world where people can roam freely.

.- / .-- --- .-. .-.. -.. / .-- .... . .-. . / .--. . --- .--. .-.. . / -.-. .- -. / .-. --- .- -- / ..-. .-. . . .-.. -.-- .-.-.-

But, what does the48dots stand for? Well, we hope we explained it above.