New Company Challenges Online Giants Travelocity, Expedia and Orbitz, Launching a Gay Travel Portal

New online gay travel portal launched, filling the void in online commerce for gay/lesbian shoppers. The new portal features the largest number of gay-owned tour operators and accommodations properties, all bookable online. Other big gay portals like www.gay.com and www.gaywired.com all have travel sections which will now be in direct competition with www.bluway.com

Atlanta, Georgia -- December 1, 2001 -- Atlanta based Internet travel company Bluway, Inc. announced today the launch of Bluway.com, the worlds ultimate travel site for gays and lesbians. The new website will offer online booking of over 3000 gay-owned and friendly accommodations, hundreds of packages from gay tour and cruise operators around the world as well as airfare, free travel personals, news, destination guides, interactive message boards and online shopping.

Gay consumers now have a choice when it comes to buying travel online," said Alex Khodorkovsky, President of Bluway. With Travelocity, Expedia and Orbitz monopolizing the online travel industry, gay shoppers had to do their own research to seek out gay-friendly travel providers. We have effectively changed that by building our own reservation network of gay-owned and friendly hotels, inns, resorts, tour and cruise companies, along with travel news, personals, and destination guide -- all on one interactive site.

With the launch of Bluway.com, some of the big commercial gay sites with travel sections, like the popular and respected sites Gay.com and Gaywired.com, will have to compete harder to attract both visitors and advertisers. Many of the features, considered premium services by other sites will be offered to Bluway.com registered users free of charge. This will include a travel personals section, gay destination guides and others.

Bluway.com will have the largest database of small, independent accommodations around the world and tour packages, with online booking, offered exclusively to the gay and lesbian community. BluWays proprietary booking system will allow any accommodation property or tour operator to sell their products online at www.bluway.com.

In addition to various interactive services it will bring to consumers, Bluway.com will offer an opportunity for advertisers to tap into an estimated 20 billion dollar market of loyal and affluent gay shoppers. According to a survey conducted by online research company Greenfield Online, 80% percent of respondents said they prefer to buy from companies that advertise to the gay and lesbian consumer market, and 44% will buy from these companies even if the prices are somewhat higher. Bluway.coms site will help gay consumers identify such companies by featuring their products or services on its site and assist others by developing effective targeted advertising campaigns.

Our community appreciates when a company, gay or straight, reaches out and makes an effort to appeal to us," said Khodorkovsky. We have hundreds of straight-owned hotels and inns who not only listed their properties on Bluway.com, but offered special BluWay discounts" to our visitors. Thats very reassuring -- it sends a message of recognition and respect to our community, and these companies will definitely be rewarded with our business."

Bluway.com plans to reach an estimated half a million visitors to its site monthly in the near future. Beginning in January of 2002, visitors to the site will have an incentive for spending their time online: Bluway.com will reward them for everything they do online, from logging in to the site to reading the news or posting a travel personals ad. The company also begins its international advertising campaign with full-page ads in gay and travel publications this month.