New Podcast: Search finds the trip. Who decides? Michael Culhane on an agentic travel marketplace

Search can show you ten great trips. Who helps you choose the right one?

In this episode of the Everything AI in Travel podcast, I speak with Michael Culhane from Mindshare about a proposed agentic marketplace for travel.

Michael's career runs from building safari camps and lodges in Botswana to travel aggregation and payment systems. He brings an operator's view to a question that has followed him through that work: how can travel businesses reach the right customer without losing so much value along the way?

His starting point is simple. Search can show you options. It doesn't tell you which one is right for you, or negotiate for it.

We recorded this on 8 October 2026. Michael talks about launch plans for November 2026 and January 2027. Those are future targets, not confirmed launches, and the marketplace scale and reach figures are his own claims. I haven't audited them.

We dig into:

🦁 Michael's move from economics into building safari camps and lodges in Botswana

🌍 The role of local communities and skills in a high-value, low-footprint tourism model

📉 Why customer-acquisition cost became his long-running travel-distribution problem

🔎 The difference between finding options and making a useful judgement about them

🧠 Why the same traveller may want something different on a family trip, a business trip or a golf holiday

🤖 His vision for a marketplace where suppliers and travellers each have agents

🤝 How supplier-side agents could negotiate offers for particular customer needs

🏨 A hypothetical hotel example of targeted offers rather than public rate cutting

💳 Using existing rewards infrastructure as a route to travel customers

🧾 Where Michael thinks blockchain could help with payments, commissions and reconciliation

❓ My pushback on whether an AI should recommend its own idea of the trip or help fulfil the traveller's existing choice

Better search is not the same as better judgement. We explore how agents might combine traveller preferences, specialist knowledge and supplier offers, and whether that helps people buy the trip they actually want.

Stuck on an AI problem in your own business? Find the AI you need: tell me what's frustrating you and I'll personally introduce you to someone who can help.

Watch the episode here.

In 2026 the podcast is now found on Spotify, Apple Podcasts and now also YouTube (and if you hit subscribe there, you get it before everyone else). You can also catch up on the whole of Series 1 now also fully available in these channels.

This could be your brand’s podcast (and newsletter).

We are currently seeking submissions from leading AI companies in travel who believe that all businesses should be media businesses.

Following the example of dojo.live and Encora we offer the opportunities to communicate your brand’s USP’s to a B2B travel audience from the leading Travel + AI resource on a bi-weekly, done-for-you basis for all of 2027 (and beyond).

Contact Tony if interested to learn more and see if we are a good fit for one another.