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Founder notes 6 min read

The agencies we turned down, and what they had in common

The agencies we turned down did not look alike in the brochure. They looked alike in the second meeting. The photos were licensed, the answers were rehearsed, and nobody in the room had been to the place they were describing this year.

Frédéric Founder note · 2026
Boats at anchor in a bay
The second meeting is where the brochure stops mattering.

The second meeting

The agencies we turned down did not look alike in the brochure. They looked alike in the second meeting. The photos were licensed, the answers were rehearsed, and nobody in the room had been to the place they were describing this year.

The common thread was not price. It was distance. A desk that sells a country it does not currently walk will always be a step behind the person who does.

Boats at anchor in a bay

What they had in common

We turned down beautiful websites and well-known names. What we kept was duller to describe: someone who can say, without checking a folder, which road is closed this month and which hotel has started cutting corners.

Distance was the common thread. A desk that sells a country it does not currently walk will always be a step behind the person who does, no matter how good the photographs are.

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