GETAWAY HOUSE

Jon Staff and Pete Davis were Harvard students when they started thinking about the paradox of modern urban life: people have more entertainment options than ever and feel more depleted than ever. The founding thesis, written up in a Harvard senior thesis by Davis, was that consumer culture offered escape but not rest — every vacation was still full of stimulation.

Their solution was almost comically simple: small cabins, near cities, no WiFi, no distractions. They built the first outpost in 2015 in the woods of New England.

The cabins were deliberately small — about 140 square feet — to make them feel like a retreat rather than a rental. The no-WiFi policy was not a cost-saving measure.

It was the product.

Getaway owns and operates small cabin outposts, each with 10-50 individual cabins, located within two hours of major US cities. Guests book for one or two nights, pay $150-$250 per night depending on the outpost and season, and get a tiny but carefully designed cabin with a full bed, a kitchenette, a big window with a forest view, and no internet connection.

Getaway makes money on the nightly rate and keeps costs down by building at scale — the cabins are modular and largely standardized. The land is leased or owned.

The business is essentially a hotel with a really good reason not to build a gym or conference center.

The core product is the Getaway outpost — a collection of 10-50 tiny cabins within two hours of a major city. Each cabin is roughly 140-200 square feet with a full bed, kitchen, bathroom, and big windows facing nature.

No WiFi. Phone lockboxes are provided for guests who want to go all in.

Seasonal and holiday pricing means popular outposts book out weeks in advance. Getaway has experimented with Getaway Scout, a subscription product that provided access to multiple outposts and early booking, though membership options have evolved over time.

Getaway grew by targeting a very specific pain point for a very specific customer: burned-out young urban professionals in expensive cities. They opened outposts near New York, Boston, Los Angeles, Chicago, Atlanta, and other major metros first — always within a two-hour drive radius, which turned out to be the magic distance.

Far enough to feel away. Close enough to actually go.

Word of mouth was strong because the experience is genuinely unusual. Their Instagram presence — minimal, aesthetic, quiet — was perfect for the audience.

They raised their Series B in 2021, during a period when COVID had everyone rethinking their relationship with urban density and outdoor space.

The challenge is scaling a deliberately simple product without ruining it. The entire value proposition is that it is not a resort.

It is not a glamping site with a cocktail bar. It is a small cabin in the woods.

The risk with growth is amenity creep — adding features to justify higher prices in a way that destroys the original point. They also face competition from Airbnb hosts who built their own cabin-in-the-woods listings after Getaway proved the concept.

And the economics of land acquisition and cabin construction near expensive cities are not forgiving. The product has fans, but the margins have to work.

Getaway raised approximately $60 million from investors including L Catterton, the consumer-focused private equity firm backed by LVMH, which participated in the Series B. Other investors included Certares and various venture funds with consumer and hospitality exposure.

The L Catterton involvement is notable — they back premium consumer experiences and lifestyle brands, which tells you exactly who Getaway's target investor thought the target customer was.