At a time when travel advisors are juggling increasing demand for customized itineraries, online platform Kimkim is committed to a simple idea: building alongside them. The global company connects advisors with vetted, in-destination specialists.
While Kimkim has been operating for more than a decade on the consumer side, its advisor-facing platform officially launched in fall 2025. The move was inspired by growing demand from advisors who were already using the site to source itineraries.
Now, Kimkim is entering a new phase of growth with the launch of its Travel Advisor Advisory Board and a broader initiative, “Built With Advisors, Designed for Growth,” reflecting a shift from offering tools for advisors to actively co-creating them.
“As our advisor program continues to grow, we didn’t want to build it in isolation,” said Yenyi Fu, chief operating officer for Kimkim. “Their insight, experience and day-to-day realities are what will shape how we evolve the platform.”
From Platform to Partner
At its core, Kimkim functions as a workflow accelerator, balancing efficiency with authentic travel experiences. Advisors submit a trip request, which is matched with one of more than 450 local destination specialists across 90 countries. From there, the advisor and specialist collaborate to build a fully customized, bookable itinerary — often within 24 hours.
“Kimkim is a technology platform built for travel advisors to really simplify and accelerate the process of creating custom multiday, multidestination itineraries,” said Kimberly Stirdivant Wason, director of travel advisor partnerships for Kimkim. “Advisors will always remain front and center in this client-relationship process.”
One of the biggest friction points advisors face today is time, reinforcing Kimkim’s goal of being a true partner for advisors by turning around itineraries quickly.
“We’ve heard it can take three, five, even 10 days to get an itinerary back,” Wason said. “And that means that there's the potential for them to lose that client or lose that booking. We are solving this problem of returning an itinerary back to them so quickly that they're able to really manage multiple trip requests simultaneously and faster.”
Kimkim’s Travel Advisor Advisory Board
The newly formed Travel Advisor Advisory Board — made up of six experienced advisors — is designed to formalize collaboration. Members meet regularly with Kimkim leadership and provide structured feedback on everything from workflow improvements to feature prioritization. The board’s impact is already visible.
“We're a new entrant into the space, and we felt it was really important not just to build something and hope advisors come — but to really build something with them,” Wason said. “Our product development is really directly informed by advisors who are using the platform and the real-world needs of advisors across different sorts of business models.”
Recent platform updates, including clearer commission visibility and improved client handoff tools, stem directly from advisor input. Upcoming co-branding capabilities and a recently launched mobile app were also formed through this feedback loop.
Travelers can easily access their itineraries and booking confirmations on the Kimkim app.
Credit: 2026 Kimkim“A lot of the internal decisions that we're making, whether it be campaign-related trade shows to attend or incentives to offer our advisors, are based off of the feedback that we are receiving from our advisory board right now,” Wason said. “We have bi-monthly calls. We have a full itinerary that we work off from the kickoff. It really is a full collaborative process.”
The Advisor Toolkit
Kimkim’s new Advisor Toolkit was a direct result of advisory board conversations. Designed to support both new and experienced advisors in managing custom travel more efficiently, the toolkit includes practical, ready-to-use resources such as destination comparison guides, a client readiness scorecard, communication scripts, objection-handling tools and email templates.
"The Advisor Toolkit is incredibly practical,” said Michelle Allen, owner of Travel Magic and a toolkit user. “It’s the kind of resource you can immediately put to work in your business. It brings structure and confidence to the custom trip planning process. It not only saves time, it helps me communicate my value more clearly and move clients toward booking with greater ease."
Bolstering advisor confidence is part of the plan, Wason says.
“A lot of these tools are created for those newer advisors so that we can help them feel more confident selling complex, multiday custom itineraries — like the client cheat sheet,” Wason said. “They give advisors a really clear framework for how to position these customized itineraries.”
For more experienced professionals, features such as destination snapshots offer quick, digestible insights to help guide client decisions without requiring deep expertise in every location.
Destination Face-Off Webinar Series
Building on that foundation, Kimkim is also launching a Destination Face-Off webinar series to help advisors guide clients to their dream destinations. Each session pairs destination specialists in a head-to-head comparison of popular destinations, exploring differences in travel style, seasonality and ideal client fit. Early matchups include Portugal vs. Spain, Iceland vs. Norway and Italy vs. Greece.
According to Wason, these face-offs will help advisors deepen their knowledge of particular destinations and feel more confident selling complex itineraries in them.
Evolving Alongside Advisors
As advisors adopt different tech tools to streamline their businesses, expectations around efficiency and integration are rising.
“I think what we're seeing in regard to adoption is that travel advisors who are adopting and want to use the latest technology are coming to Kimkim, and that's because we do streamline that entire process for them,” Wason said. “It really eliminates that messy inbox, where you might have multiple emails coming from one supplier or one vendor. They can communicate with their specialist there, they get the itineraries there, they manage their payments there. Everything is happening in our portal.”
That’s how Kimkim is positioning itself — not as a replacement for the advisor, but as an extension of their workflow.
"What stands out with Kimkim is how quickly they turn traveler requests into a meaningful, tangible itinerary," said Samantha LeBold, owner of Find Your Why Travel and a platform user. “It's helping me work more efficiently while still offering a highly personalized experience to my clients."
The company’s next steps continue to center on partnership. From joining industry organizations like the American Society of Travel Advisors to exploring preferred supplier relationships with host agencies, Kimkim is leaning on advisor input to guide its growth.
“Our ‘Built with Advisors, Designed for Growth’ [campaign] is really true to what we're trying to do with advisors,” Wason said. “We want to build our platform and product features with them. Design for growth is not only for them, but for Kimkim, too.”
