ITE59.COM
Travel Web site for last-minute travelers. At www.site59.com.
Did you forget your anniversary is next weekend? Need to grovel to make up for such a gaffe? Travel sites on the Internet are a dime a dozen, but not many of them give busy execs and procrastinators last-minute prepackaged options with guaranteed availability and prices that won’t break the bank. Site59.com offers consumers packaged getaways that combine air and hotel costs and often include other perks such as dinner reservations, tours or tee times. The pluses: air fares that are less than what you’d pay on your own at the last minute, prepackaged trips that eliminate the need to plan and some flexibility in travel times. Most trips are offered for Thursday-through-Sunday, Friday-through-Sunday or Friday-through-Monday, and they are currently available from about a dozen U.S. cities. (Trips from Orange County launched earlier this month.) You can choose from simple getaways, romantic interludes or “red carpet” trips, and buy instantly online. But there are a few caveats. Some parts of this graphic-intensive site can be a little slow to load. Car rental, though prearranged, is not included in most package pricing. Suggested activities, sometimes highlighted in the package title, are also extra. And the price of some packages isn’t much different than what you could scramble for on your own, e.g. a round-trip flight from LAX to San Francisco with two nights’ lodging was $339 per person. But a Denver golf excursion with flights, two nights at a Lowe’s resort and a pro golf school for $649 per person looked enticing, as did a Napa tour for $673 a person that included flights, two nights’ lodging, a limousine tour of the wine country and fine dining on Saturday night. By the way, the VP for content at New York-based Site59 is Newport Beach native Jeff Glueck.
