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Africa, Travel Startups, Travel Tech

Launch of In Your Pocket City Essential App for Joburg

In Your Pocket City App has recently launched in Johannesburg, South Africa and we’re sharing a little bit about how Laurice Taitz-Buntman of Travel Massive Johannesburg is helping travellers put the city in their back pocket with recommendations of mainstream and off the beaten track destinations.

In late 2013, Johannesburg joined more than 70 cities that publish In Your Pocket City Guides. What’s exciting about the app is that it’s free to download, and works offline. It contains a refined selection of our recommended restaurants, nightlife, cafes, sights plus travel and transport information, and soon they’ll be adding hotels and shopping.

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Who is your app for?

Joburg is such a tricky city to know, so from the start our Johannesburg In Your Pocket guide has been designed for visitors and locals (who sometimes know less about the city than curious travellers). You’ll find the expected alongside the unexpected, enough to keep mainstream travellers happy while also offering recommendations that are off the beaten track and require a more adventurous spirit.

What inspired you to start this app in JoBurg?

First I secured the In Your Pocket licence to publish a print guide for Johannesburg. We also publish a free weekly newsletter sharing the best of what’s on weekly. The app is a next step. I really believe in the complementarity of media, and that at different times a traveller has different requirements. For leisure time and in low or no bandwidth print is unbeatable, for exploring you want a big screen and for searching and finding you want the information in your pocket.

Our website content is incredibly extensive, having been built up over more than two years. The app allows us to be highly selective.

This is a city that is still coming into its own as a tourist destination after years of Apartheid isolation, and what feels like a brief 22 years of democracy.

Joburg has been popular as a business travel and conferencing destination. It’s only recently that the city has started to recognize and position itself as a tourist city. This is probably attributable to having grown up in the shadow of its much prettier sister Cape Town. A friend of mine summed it up neatly: ‘If cities had profiles on a dating website, Cape Town would be the gorgeous blonde in the bikini while Joburg would be the one with the really great personality.’

What makes your app different from other similar travel apps out there?

The quality and variety of our content and the simplicity of use. The first review of Johannesburg In Your Pocket came from The Times newspaper which called us “the intelligent guide to Joburg”. It’s our mission to be worthy of that title.

How is your app changing the future of the industry or helping to make travel better?

Everything that we do at In Your Pocket is about enhancing people’s experience of a city, of sharing information from city insiders, information that travelers might not otherwise come across.  

Do you have any tips for new entrepreneurs who want to create a successful startup?

It’s like packing your suitcase for a trip. You need to take some vital items with if you want to enjoy your journey. My top five are: curiosity, planning, perseverance, a good accounting package, and someone who offers a shoulder to lean or cry on, and cheers you when things are going well.


Travel Start-Up is a monthly series that profiles unique online travel start-ups in the Travel Massive community around the world. Connect with Laurice and In Your Pocket on Travel Massive and Facebook


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