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    Lawrence Phillips is empowering Black travelers with the information they need to journey confidently across the U.S. and the world. 

    Founded in 2018, Green Book Global is a website and mobile app that allows Black travelers to share their experiences of “traveling while Black” in a single community. The platform serves both international travelers looking for destination insights and U.S. road-trippers seeking safer routes.

    For international destinations, ratings are aggregated into a single score to help inform future travelers about what to expect. In the U.S., Black travelers can access a nationwide road trip planner to help identify and avoid sundown towns. A sundown town is a place where Black people historically faced threats, violence, or exclusion, especially after dark. While sundown towns were prohibited in 1968, some still discriminate against Black people today. 

    Building an App from Personal Experience

    Before founding Green Book Global, Phillips started his professional journey with an electrical engineering degree from Georgia Tech. After graduation, he worked in engineering and IT consulting at Accenture, building applications from scratch and leading testing teams. In his role as a team manager, Phillips flew repeatedly between Atlanta and San Diego, eventually burning out and resigning. 

    With accumulated frequent-flyer miles, Phillips had the time and space to travel, so he booked a Delta around-the-world ticket. “As a Black traveler, I was nervous,” Phillips told UrbanGeekz. Even when destinations received glowing reviews, he still had to ask himself, “Should I go here? Yeah, absolutely. Is it racist? I don’t know.” Traveling while Black demands extra emotional and logistical labor to gauge whether you are going to feel safe and welcomed in a country. 

    Black travelers spend an estimated $145 billion each year. Yet few mainstream platforms are designed around the specific safety concerns and cultural experiences Black people navigate. 

    During his research, Phillips would often stumble upon Instagram posts or social media reviews from individual travelers. But he wanted crowdsourced insights from multiple Black travelers for each destination. That’s when the idea of Green Book Global was born. 

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    Green Book Global 

    Phillips was inspired by the original Negro Motorist Green Book, an annual guidebook created in 1936 by African American postal worker Victor Green. The guide provided Black travelers with listings of establishments that welcomed Black people during the Jim Crow era of legally enforced racial segregation. 

    Green Book Global is like “a Black TripAdvisor.” They collect user-generated reviews from their community of over 100,000 people to build information on cities all over the world. Users review travel destinations across nine pillars, such as black-friendliness, adventure, affordability, nightlife, and relaxation.

    “We don’t encourage or discourage anyone to go anywhere. We just try to give you information so you can make a decision on what you want to do,” Phillips explained. 

    How Green Book Global Works 

    Green Book Global is free to download on the App Store and Play Store. Users can access all reviews across North America and the Caribbean without paying. Phillips prioritized access in regions where concerns around racism and traveler safety are greatest. 

    For destinations in Africa, Europe, and other regions, the app provides overall destination scores and a limited number of reviews for free. Additional traveler insights sit behind a premium membership tier. 

    Unlike traditional travel platforms, Green Book Global also compensates users for contributing reviews. Premium members can earn rewards after reaching certain review milestones. This approach encourages more detailed, community-driven reporting.

    The platform has expanded into travel bookings through cashback partnerships with companies including Expedia, Marriott, Hotels.com, and Booking.com. Users receive cashback when booking through the app, while Green Book Global earns affiliate revenue from the transactions.

    Green Book Global also offers a road trip planner across the U.S. that highlights communities flagged by users as unsafe for Black travelers: a road trip planner across the U.S. that highlights sundown towns where Black people are not welcome. 

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    Using Green Book Global to Avoid Sundown Towns

    During Jim Crow and segregation in the U.S., sundown towns were settlements across the country that excluded people of color from staying after dark. This racial segregation was enforced through housing discrimination, intimidation, and collective violence. Sundown towns were theoretically abolished in 1968 when the Fair Housing Act prohibited racial discrimination in the sale, rental, financing, or advertising of housing. But in practice, some communities continue to exhibit patterns associated with sundown towns. 

     In the app, users simply input their starting location and destination. It will use user-aggregated scores to generate route options while identifying towns flagged by community safety scores. After a limited number of free route generations, users are prompted to upgrade.

    Expedia’s Open World Accelerator

    While Phillips has largely bootstrapped Green Book Global since day one, the startup was selected from hundreds of applicants for Expedia’s Open World group accelerator program. Phillips was the only founder focused specifically on Black travel.

    The program awarded Green Book Global a $25,000 grant, but the long-term value extended far beyond funding. Expedia encouraged Phillips to always adopt a tester’s mindset when making decisions about the app. Instead of relying on assumptions, the company encouraged founders to continuously test messaging, onboarding flows, and user experiences through A/B testing and analytics. 

    One Expedia-funded ad campaign also produced the defining tagline: “Feel safer as a Black traveler.” The highest-performing ad copy later became the platform’s permanent in-app messaging and brand promise.

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    Pouring Back into the Black Community 

    For Phillips, Green Book Global is more than a travel app, but also a way to reinvest in the community. With Black travelers spending as much as $145 billion annually, Phillips is on a mission to funnel that back to the community. Black-owned businesses, restaurants, and cultural hubs are spotlighted on the app, helping channel Black travel dollars toward businesses that are often overlooked by mainstream tourism. 

    Beyond commerce, Phillips is also intentional about supporting Black non-profits and social impact ventures. In their latest partnership with The Gathering Spot (TGS), a portion of revenue generated by TGS members through the app goes directly to a non-profit in Atlanta. Youth Empowerment Success Services supports Black youth aged 18-24 to escape homelessness by providing affordable housing and community support. 

    In a world where Black travelers have often been underserved, Phillips is using technology, data, and collective knowledge to help users explore the world with greater confidence.

    Main Image: Lawrence Phillips

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    The post This Entrepreneur Built an App to Help Black Travelers Avoid Sundown Towns appeared first on UrbanGeekz.

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