Luxury apartment rental startup Lyric ($STAYLYRIC) is in growth mode right now - and so far, early stages of social media engagement reflect a positive response for the high-end business travel company. CEO Andrew Mitchell says it's a sign of the company's priority of focusing on quality, tech, and community that's helping to drive good reviews.
"We spend a lot of time creating high-quality spaces," said Mitchell, speaking at the Skift Short-Term Rental Summit in New York December 5. That goes all the way down to including local coffee and snacks and artists murals at its locations, which have grown to 500 across 12 cities, the property rental startup's CEO said.
The company is still expanding into new markets - since it reeled in a $160 million debt-and-equity round earlier this year - but the early returns (read: its comments from users this fall) suggest engagement is growing, and in a positive way. Thinknum tracks Facebook ($FB) Talking About Count, which spiked around Thanksgiving as more and more travelers hit the road for the holidays. Further, a look at its Facebook page reveals mostly happy recommendations.
Lyric keeps on growing, and in an environment where property-sharing networks are increasingly at odds with one another (and at times, their own investors), seeing the company grow headcount steadily by about 83% over the course of the year is another positive data point. The lux/travel space is a crowded one and Sonder ($PRIVATE:SONDER), a similar startup with a lot more cash, has used its advantage to catapult itself to an aggressive growth rate. But, as we've learned in the past - and especially in the property-disruption space, scale is only an advantage, until it isn't.
Over this same time, the number of job postings Lyric has online has decreased (not shown), perhaps a signal that the company is able to quickly fill roles as other property rental and sharing companies struggle to maintain their own growth trajectory. And, clearly, a sign that it's not letting growth get out of hand.
"We're seeing the mainstreaming of the entire industry right now," Mitchell said. "The position we're trying to stake out is at the high-end quality of the market."
About the Data:
Thinknum tracks companies using the information they post online - jobs, social and web traffic, product sales and app ratings - and creates data sets that measure factors like hiring, revenue and foot traffic. Data sets may not be fully comprehensive (they only account for what is available on the web), but they can be used to gauge performance factors like staffing and sales.
