A Decade of Bespoke Journeys

You might not know this, but in 2023 we’re celebrating 10 years since we started Beyond Dracula. Yuhu! In June 2013, I joined Giulio and Alexandra da Sacco, as the managing partner for something which, at the time, was an idea only: to put Romania on the map of bespoke travel. What you might also not know is that when I joined, the company already existed, it had a name and a logo. I had 0 to do with that.

Good Friday feels like the right time to send this month’s gratitude email. And this is a very personal one because we would not be here, 10 years after Beyond Dracula was just an idea, without you. Every single interaction we had, whether it led to a call, an email exchange or a trip, made us who we are today.

This month’s gratitude email is a special one. We’re midway in our celebratory year, the one marking 10 years since we started Beyond Dracula with the idea to show Romania to travelers who wanted to discover it. This idea was simple enough that without any experience in the travel industry and none building and running a business, I got it. It made sense.

If you have been reading my newsletters for a while, you know they are about Romania. Stories, insights, news. You also know that offering a destination for which there is no demand is quite a challenge, but to keep myself sane and motivated, I see it as an opportunity. Something else that drives us all at Beyond Dracula is hope.

This month’s gratitude email is dedicated to people in my life who played a role so that I can study, work and be where I am today. I’ll start with my parents. You see, my parents dreamt of discovering the world but they couldn’t because of communism. After the revolution in 1989, they joined the entrepreneurial wave opening serial business in logistics, retail, hospitality. I saw my parents with 0 training or models in business, create, run and grow businesses.

The title is not a mistake. Let me explain. Beyond Dracula has a godfather, and he is Nepalese. As part of the series of gratitude emails that mark our 10 years anniversary, I want to share this special story with you.

This month’s gratitude email is about PURE, the trade show we’ve been attending since 2014. Do you recall how Pawan, our Nepalese godfather, said he goes to WTM in London to help his country but gets business from PURE? Clueless about what he meant, I took notes and checked everything out.

The other day, we got this beautiful feedback from a couple who did a cruise extension with us in Transylvania. “Our favorite part of the trip was the post-cruise time in Romania. It is such a diverse, welcoming, thriving and fascinating country. Our guide, Alex, served as our driver as well as guide the entire time and he was superb (actually, I would say overqualified). If we return to Romania, we would include a nature visit to the Danube delta to be with the wildlife there. Another reason that it was the favorite part of our trip is that we were on our own and not in a larger group.” This warms my heart.

In a world in which you can be anything, be a Wendy. Or a George. In this month’s gratitude email, I want to thank Wendy Perrin for being open to have us on her WOW List and for sending over travelers to test me as a TTE (Trusted Travel Expert). You see, not everyone showed us the same kind of openness. Wendy took a chance on us and Romania, and for that, I am very grateful.

Celebrating 10 years of Beyond Dracula, is special because, during this period, not only did I create the company, but I also built a family. You could say my 30s were about creating families: at home, at work, around Romania. I got married in 2014, had my daughter Magdalena in 2016, and my son Tudor in 2019.