Hellotickets opens up the world of payments with Primer

Hellotickets is part of the new generation of travel experience platforms. Its mission is to empower travelers to effortlessly book tickets, tours, and activities worldwide. 

It was founded by Jorge Díaz Largo, who struggled to find tickets to an NBA game while on a holiday in New York in 2017. Frustrated by the ordeal, Jorge's wife had an epiphany: why not create a platform catering to international tourists, offering seamless ticketing in their language and currency?

And thus, Hellotickets was born.

Fast-forward to today. Hellotickets operates in over 20 countries, offering tickets to thousands of events and activities—from museum admissions to tours and transfers. And it's growing rapidly, aiming to hit €100 million in sales in 2024—up from just €4 million three years ago.

We caught up with Jorge to learn more about the Hellotickets story, its payment challenges as the business expands globally, and why it has chosen Primer to resolve these challenges and make payments a differentiator. 

Hellotickets is growing very fast. What challenges has it created, and how has this impacted how you view payments?

We're no different to any growing company. We face the usual challenges of managing multiple moving parts and encountering new situations daily. 

While we've dealt with most of these challenges, payments were one that we consistently struggled to solve.

We're already operating in over twenty countries, and we've learned the hard way that payments are very different from market to market, demanding that we use different services and take distinct approaches. 

With ambitions to expand into many new markets, payments became a significant blocker to our growth plans.

Is that what led you to look for a solution like Primer? 

I had heard about solutions like Primer, but I'm not a payment expert and didn't really get what they did. I thought they required setting up multiple integrations for each new payment method, which sounded complicated and not suitable for us.

My perspective changed during an interview with a candidate for a product management role. They explained how these platforms worked and highlighted Primer as a leader in the space. I contacted Primer to explore further and see if it could be a good match for our needs.

And why did you choose to go with Primer? What stood out about the overall offering?

We spoke with several platforms during the evaluation processes. While many claim to provide comparable solutions, Primer is in a league of its own in terms of its solution, underlying technology, and levels of services. 

We're looking for a long-term partner and Primer tickets that box. It's financially stable, backed by strong investors, processes billions of euros in payments, and has a strong, knowledgeable team. 

But what sealed the deal for us was the user-friendly documentation and modern interface. We wanted a platform that would make our lives easier. Primer's sleek design and clear instructions were strong indicators that it would deliver the simplicity we wanted while making payments a strategic asset for Hellotickets. 

You're about to go live. Tell me about the support you've received from the Primer team throughout the process. And what are your plans once you go live?

I can't fault the Primer team's support; it's been fantastic—very responsive and quick. I'm honestly excited to go live and start our journey together.

Once we're live, one of our initial priorities will be revamping our checkout process. With Primer's Universal Checkout, we gain complete control over crafting the checkout experience, including determining which payment methods to display to customers in various markets. This flexibility is essential to us, as delivering a unique, local experience is at the core of why we started Hellotickets to begin with. 

We'll also start paying much more attention to what our payment data tells us. We've never had the opportunity to do this before, but with Primer, we can because it consolidates all our payment data into a single dashboard that's super easy to navigate and understand. This will empower us to compare strategies, conduct A/B tests, and address issues proactively. We aim to leverage these insights to optimize the customer experience and drive positive impacts on our bottom line.

You're looking to improve fraud prevention. How are you planning to use the Sift integration to do this? Why was using this direct integration more appealing than using a service outside of Primer?

One of Primer's superpowers is its ability to consolidate all our payment services, something invaluable to a business like ours that wants to avoid dealing with the complexity of multiple integrations. Using Primer's integration with Sift was a no-brainer for us, it allowing us to seamlessly combine fraud detection with payment processing, particularly in regions like Latin America or Southeast Asia, where fraud detection may not be as advanced as in the US. This holistic approach bolsters our defenses against fraud and enhances the volume of legitimate payments, contributing to our overall performance. 

What do you want to achieve with Primer once you're live in the next few months? What core KPIs will you be tracking?

We want to expand our local payment options in Latin America and Southeast Asia. For example, PIX in Brazil is crucial, and we haven't offered it yet. We also can get more competitive pricing by routing payments to the best processor for each transaction.

Looking ahead to the next few years, what plans does Hellotickets have to continue to set itself apart from its competition? And how do payments—and Primer—contribute to this?

Our goal is to have a unique global footprint, being present in more than 50 countries. Primer is helping us achieve this faster, at least on the payments side.

Get in touch to learn how Primer can help make payments a strategic growth level in your business.