The Airbnb of Family Travel: Kid & Coe
We've been talking a lot here lately about how to select manage accommodations once your family starts to grow and a standard hotel room is no longer the ideal arrangement. There are lots of ways to deal with this from just sucking it up and all staying together in 300 square feet, which is very much what we did growing up and still do often with our two girls. You can also get connecting rooms, rent a suite, or venture into renting entire apartments and homes. We have rented some beautiful homes for trips with extended family, but your generic Airbnb isn't always the best choice for young families on a short stay.
Imagine for a minute that you had the additional living space and authentic locations of some of the nicer Airbnb properties, combined with amenities and information just for families. If you turned that idea that into a business, you just came up with basically the same concept as a company called Kid & Coe.
In my mind, Kid & Coe is an upscale Airbnb tailed just for families. I've never used them or talked directly to the company, but I'm fascinated with the concept. They have about 1,000 properties around the world that have been 'curated' to meet the needs of traveling families. According to their website, a property can make the Kid & Coe cut because it is in a great location for family travelers, it is safe and appropriate for kids, it is stylish, and/or it has amenities unique for families such as cribs, high chairs, play areas, or toys. Some of their properties seem much more kid-friendly than others, but keep in mind that some families have younger kids and some have older kids. Once you remember that fact of life, it makes sense that not all of the properties have things like cribs and high chairs already in the home.
These 1,000+ Kid & Coe curated properties can be found in places including Rhode Island, Hamptons, Montreal, Manhattan, Austin, Nova Scotia, Orlando, Scotland, California, the Caribbean, Costa Rica, Denmark, Thailand, and beyond. That said, they are not yet everywhere by any stretch of the imagination, so this won't be your new one-stop-shop for all of your family's lodging needs.
From a pricing standpoint, I saw some Kid & Coe properties that were available for a couple hundred dollars per night or less, and some that were thousands of dollars per night. Speaking of which, who wants to go in on this beachfront, staffed, six-bedroom villa with two pools in Thailand?
Many, or perhaps most, of the properties available on the Kid & Coe website can be found on other rental websites such as Airbnb or even Oasis, the serviced-home rental site with a Hyatt tie-in. However, I like that Kid & Coe approaches the home rental process from a family perspective and helps narrow down the search a bit by focusing on the properties that are most likely to appeal to families.
My 2019 travel goals list is growing rapidly, but trying out Kid & Coe has now been added since their concept is spot-on with what many families theoretically want and need. Family travel should be more about experiencing the journey and less about simply managing logistics, so the more than companies cater to eliminating some of the logistical challenges of family travel, the better. I'd love to hear what you think of this Airbnb for families concept and whether your family has ever used Kid & Coe (or even heard of them)?