February 28, 2025

The Honest Unfiltered Story Of How Atomic Trips Changed Group Trips

Who is Atomic Trips? The Story Behind the Affordable All-Inclusive Group Trips Travel Brand

In the world of travel, finding a genuinely affordable all-inclusive European vacation package can feel impossible. But for Atomic Trips, affordability isn’t just a marketing tactic, it’s a philosophy.

Founded by Sabrina and Matt, Atomic Trips was built with one goal in mind: to make Europe accessible to travelers who never thought they could afford it. Their story is one of grit, adaptability, and a deep love for travel.

Born Without a Safety Net: How Atomic Trips Was Built from the Ground Up

Not every entrepreneur has a family legacy of wealth or a built-in network of advisors to guide them. Some start with investors, safety nets, and second chances. Others, like Sabrina and Matt, build something from nothing, with no guarantees and no one to catch them if they fall.

Both grew up watching their single mothers fight for stability, working tirelessly to keep food on the table. Their fathers were largely absent, leaving them with an understanding from an early age: if they wanted something, they had to figure out how to get it themselves.

“Maybe that’s why we’ve always been scrappy,” Sabrina reflects. “When you grow up knowing no one is coming to save you, you learn how to build things from nothing.”

For them, business wasn’t about chasing luxury; it was about creating a better life for their families that felt secure and free. Their entrepreneurial mindset didn’t come from privilege it was born from necessity.

But their story is about more than resilience. Some couples find each other and settle into routine lives, while others lift each other up and push toward something bigger.

Sabrina and Matt, are the latter.

They aren’t just partners in life; they became partners in ambition, each bringing different strengths to the table. Matt, raised by a family of tour guides, had an instinct for growing knowledge and embracing adventure. Sabrina, with a background in executive assistance, design, and tech communication, had a sharp business mind and a knack for structuring growth strategies.

“We weren’t willing to wait for permission,” Sabrina says. “We wanted something we could build ourselves, something that let us live the kind of life we weren’t sure we’d ever have growing up.”

That drive became the foundation of Atomic Trips, a business built on hustle, self-reliance, and a shared dream to make group trips to Ireland and all-inclusive travel in Europe accessible to more people.

Atomic Trips

Got Travel Questions?

Book a Free Live Discovery Call With Gabe

When we say we’re with you every step of the way, we mean it. Book a free call with the team who plans, supports, and travels with you through Europe.

Building from Scratch: The Airbnb Business That Started It All

Before scooters, before travel, before Atomic Trips was even an idea, Sabrina and Matt were in the short-term rental game. They weren’t just running a few Airbnbs, they were operating at a level that most people hadn’t even realized was possible yet.

Back then, Airbnb arbitrage wasn’t a mainstream business model. Few people understood that you could rent multiple apartments, furnish them, and sublet them as short-term stays without actually owning the properties. But Sabrina was ahead of the curve.

“I was one of the original arbitrators and the first users of Airbnb, starting back in 2012,” she explains. “Before it became the trendy thing to do, I was already making deals with apartment complexes, getting special permissions, and locking in units specifically for short-term rentals.”

It wasn’t easy, and it wasn’t something just anyone could do. Unlike today, where rental arbitrage has been overrun with online courses and YouTube tutorials, back then, it was all about relationships and figuting it out. Sabrina had to build trust with landlords, negotiate special agreements, and prove that running short-term rentals wouldn’t cause problems for the property owners. This led to a large clientele of homeowners partnering with her to oversee their properties as they entered the market. Sabrina & Matt would attend community meetings and vouch that with their service, you’d see no party houses, scam guests, or squatters. Homeowners lined up to be clients of their management service.

And they pulled it off.

For years, Sabrina and Matt managed multiple high-end Airbnb properties in Las Vegas. They didn’t just rent out units; they curated experiences for those needing guidance on what to do in Las Vegas. Every home was fully furnished, styled, and stocked to feel like a boutique hotel.

It was a high-profit business, but it also had high stakes.

At any moment, laws could change. Regulations were always looming, and the industry was unpredictable.

They knew that their success wasn’t permanent, but for a while, it was thriving.

They weren’t just making money from bookings, they were finding ways to maximize every rental.

💰 Charging premium rates for high-demand weekends and conventions.
🛎️ Offering add-on services like stocked fridges, early check-ins, and customized local guides.
📈 Upselling luxury touches like private chefs, event setups, and VIP Vegas experiences.

It wasn’t about posting listings on Airbnb and hoping for the best. It was a carefully curated journey to ensure a property was qualified for renting.

Building Atomic Scooters: The Side Business That Became a Lifeline

Running an Airbnb business was lucrative, but it was never stable. Sabrina and Matt always knew that the industry could shift at any moment. Laws could change, competition could flood the market, or something unexpected could wipe out everything they had built.

So, while short-term rentals paid the bills, they were always looking for ways to diversify.

That’s when they heard about a new opportunity in Las Vegas: scooters.

At the time, companies like Lime and Bird had already tried—and failed—to operate in the city. Las Vegas had strict regulations, and these big-name brands struggled to meet the city’s requirements. But Las Vegas wasn’t giving up on scooters. They just needed the right operator.

Sabrina and Matt saw a gap in the market.

“We realized Vegas wanted scooters, in a safe way; they wanted someone local, someone who would actually work with them instead of just dumping scooters on the sidewalks and hoping for the best,” Sabrina explains.

So, while still running their Airbnb business, they started working on Atomic Scooters.

📝 They wrote a 70-page operations plan, outlining exactly how they would run the business.
🏛️ They met with city planners, attorneys, ward council members, and police officials to build a legal framework for scooters.
🛴 They invested every extra dollar into building a fleet and finding a location.

And it worked.

When the city granted them the exclusive rights to operate e-scooters in Las Vegas, they knew they had something real.

For the next year, Atomic Scooters ran alongside their Airbnb business.

In addition to renting scooters, they were offering guided tours, team-building experiences, and corporate events. The business was growing, and for the first time, it felt like they had built true financial security through diversifying their growth.

As this all began, they landed a prime location in Container Park in downtown Las Vegas. They were fully booked, running at full capacity, and on track to expand even further.

Everything was working.

And then, everything came crashing down overnight.

The Day It All Disappeared

When the pandemic hit, it didn’t happen in slow motion. It was instant.

Las Vegas shut down, tourism vanished, and every booking across both businesses was wiped out overnight.

The most significant blow came from Airbnb.

With a single corporate decision, Airbnb refunded hundreds of thousands of dollars in future bookings across all hosts worldwide. They didn’t ask the hosts for approval. They just took the money and gave it back to the guests.

For Sabrina and Matt, that meant zero revenue instantly, and it sent them into the negative as each day passed.

“We had guests booked months in advance, and suddenly, every single one was refunded. No warning, no discussion, just—gone,” Sabrina recalls.

It wasn’t just a setback. It was a full collapse.

The worst part? Their clients were furious.

Some had invested huge amounts in their short-term rental businesses. When their money disappeared, many turned to lawsuits against Airbnb to recover their losses. Some foreclosed on their homes mid-lockdown because they were investment properties.

Sabrina and Matt were suddenly stuck in lockdown, watching years of work get erased in real time.

But they weren’t starting from zero.

They still had one thing left…Atomic Scooters.

And that was about to become their lifeline.

The Rebirth of Atomic Scooters: A Business That Refused to Die

The pandemic was brutal for businesses, small and large. Restaurants shuttered, tourism dried up, and even major corporations struggled to stay afloat. Las Vegas, a city built on experiences, went quiet.

For many, it was the end of the road. But for Sabrina and Matt, it was just another test of perseverance.

Every business has a turning point, a moment when the path forward shifts, often in ways no one expects. For Sabrina and Matt, that moment didn’t come from a sudden stroke of genius or a perfectly timed market trend.

It came from their ingrained curse to ensure survival.

Before Atomic Trips, and after managing rentals, there was now only Atomic Scooters.

What started as a dream: to build something of their own, to carve out a space in Las Vegas that was unique, exciting, and theirs. Became a mission to now stay afloat. Every dollar they made was saved or reinvested into Atomic Scooters before the pandemic wiped it all away.

For months, the streets of Las Vegas were empty. There were no tourists, no rentals, no income. The business sat frozen, waiting for the city to wake back up.

“It was mind-boggling to sit through lockdown, realizing that one business had died and another had risen from its ashes. But scooters were never the goal—they were a means to diversify, a safety net in case we could no longer fill thousand-dollar bookings. We built Atomic Scooters with small goals in mind, something simple, something affordable, something that could survive a recession if we ever needed it to. I never knew that only a year later it would become our primary business and thrive because of lock-down.”

-Sabrina

And thrive it did.

First to Reopen: The Unexpected Birth of Atomic Trips

While other businesses scrambled to adapt, Atomic Scooters had an advantage: the city had their back & they were perfect for social distancing.

Officials knew that Las Vegas needed to recover, but safely. People were eager to get outside, to move, to explore again, but they weren’t ready for packed casinos or crowded venues.

Scooters, however, were different.

🚲 Socially distanced by design.
🌞 Outdoor activity in the open air.
💡 A fun, easy way for people to experience Vegas safely.

Because Sabrina and Matt had spent years building trust with the city, Atomic Scooters became one of the first businesses approved to reopen.

And when it did, business exploded.

For the first time in months, people were out again. Riding through the streets, cruising downtown, experiencing a sense of freedom after so much isolation.

For a moment, it felt like a new golden era.

Riding the High—Until It Crashed

For the first year or so, Atomic Scooters thrived.

The demand was nonstop. Locals, travelers, and even corporate groups booked rides. It felt like a complete resurgence.

But just as fast as it picked up, it faded.

The post-pandemic spending surge burned out quickly. People ran out of stimulus money, priorities shifted, and big corporations were spending larger marketing budgets to overshadow little businesses. The boom they felt began to sizzle down.

What once felt like a blessed comeback slowly turned into an exhausting grind.

Atomic Scooters wasn’t failing, but it wasn’t growing either.

And that’s when Sabrina and Matt started asking themselves the hardest question of all:

Is this really what we want?

For the first two years after COVID, Atomic Scooters was everything. They weren’t just renting out scooters; they were building an experience for customers. Matt led thoughtful foodie tours, curated self-guided tours, organized team-building events, and formed partnerships with big-name companies. Every decision was about growth.

They worked six days a week, training staff, expanding their operations, and maintaining a full-scale rental business.

They were stuck.

Atomic Scooters needed to be open 14-hour-a-day to hit financial goals and reach the peak hour rushes.

It was stable, it was profitable—but it felt like a prison.

They weren’t traveling. They weren’t creating something new. They were maintaining a business that, while successful, wasn’t the future they had dreamed of.

Still, they pushed forward. They had moved their operations to The Fremont 9 mid-COVID, setting up a live-work loft that doubled as their scooter shop. But deep down, they knew: this wasn’t it.

Atomic Trips was in the back of their minds, a distant possibility. But an opposite approach to diversifying. Atomic Trips meant setting aside the small but safe business for something big & risky.

Join me, Sabrina, The Founder of Atomic Trips, for my weekly Let’s Talk Travel Zoom Q&A where I break down everything you need to know about my all-inclusive group trips! Whether you’re curious about destinations, accommodations, what’s included, or how payment plans work, this is your chance to get all your questions answered directly.

Let's Talk Travel

Yolo.

Surviving the collapse of their Airbnb business and riding the unpredictable wave of Atomic Scooters taught Sabrina and Matt one thing: Stability is an illusion, but adaptability is everything.

They had built two businesses from the ground up, navigated an economic crash, legal hurdles and marathons, and industry-wide disruptions. But one thing never changed—their core belief in remaining honest and reliable in the work they do and their love for travel.

And that’s what ultimately led them to Atomic Trips.

“It didn’t start as a business idea. It started with people asking for help.” Matt mentions.

In every Airbnb they managed, there was a framed “Your Host” photo, but it was never a generic business portrait. It was always a photo of them traveling.

It became a conversation starter. Guests would see their photos of themselves standing in front of the Eiffel Tower, hiking through the Irish countryside, or riding scooters in the streets of Italy and start asking questions.

🔹 “How do you afford to travel so much?”
🔹 “Where should I go in Europe?”
🔹 “Can you help me plan my trip?”

At first, they answered casually. But, some guests took it a step further:

🔹 “Would you take me there and show me and my group around?”

And so, long before Atomic Trips had a name, Sabrina and Matt started leading small, informal group trips. They would plan itineraries, help with logistics, and guide travelers through Europe, not as a business, but as a way to travel for free while helping people who needed guidance.

They weren’t just a couple who dreamed of travel. They had already lived it.

There’s a thread that runs through every part of this story, through every pivot, every business venture, and every unexpected turn. But it’s something we haven’t fully talked about yet.

While running their Airbnb business, the one thing that always defined Sabrina and Matt’s lives was their geographical showing off. The two loved to travel from the moment they made their first dollar.

While most people were still adjusting to the concept of remote work, Sabrina and Matt were some of the first real digital nomads. Years before the work-from-anywhere movement took off, they had already been all over the world, running their business from their laptops while exploring new countries.

So when they finally decided to turn Atomic Trips into something real, they weren’t just guessing at what made a great travel experience. They knew.

The decision to finally move forward didn’t happen overnight. It came after years of conversations, late nights spent weighing the risks, running numbers, and questioning whether they were truly ready to gamble everything on this idea.

They knew what it would take. Every dollar they had saved. Every hour of work that could have gone into growing the scooter shop. It wasn’t just a new business, it was a full stop on the only thing keeping them afloat.

If it failed, there was no safety net.

But if it worked? It would be the life they had always dreamed of.

They turned off their calendar, shut down bookings, and walked away from the business that had been keeping them afloat.

Instead of playing it safe, they got on a plane.

They flew to Europe, met with vendors, walked through hotels, toured locations, tasted every dish, and made sure every detail was perfect. This wasn’t just about picking destinations—it was about curating experiences that felt as seamless and effortless as the kind of travel they had always wanted for themselves.

Then came the final step, the one that made it all real.

They packed up their lives, stored their belongings, and said goodbye to the home they had built in Vegas.

Instead of returning to a high-rise loft overlooking the Strip, they moved to Albania—into a small one-bedroom apartment that cost 1/8th of what they had been spending in Vegas.

It was a drastic change, but it was exactly what they needed.

They hired a small, dedicated team.

They built Atomic Trips from the ground up.

And they haven’t looked back since.

Atomic Trips is Born

Most travel companies aren’t built by travelers. They’re built by corporations that see travel as a numbers game, a way to extract as much profit as possible from people who just want to see the world.

Sabrina and Matt have seen exactly how big travel brands manipulate pricing.

They know:

🚨 How they jack up rates with fake “limited-time deals,”
🚨 How they cut corners while charging premium prices.
🚨 How they take something simple—like a train ride—and inflate the cost just to pad their margins.

And they refuse to run their business that way.

“We could charge more,” Sabrina admits. “We know exactly how companies do it. We could tweak the pricing structure, add on hidden fees, and make way more money—but that’s not who we are. It’s not what we stand for.”

Atomic Trips isn’t just a business. It’s a reflection of who they are as people.

-Sabrina

They grew up without money, without privilege, without family connections to open doors for them. They know what it’s like to dream of travel and feel like it’s just out of reach.

And that’s exactly why Atomic Trips exists.

More Than a Trip. A Real Travel Family

With most corporate travel companies, booking a trip is transactional. You’re a number, a seat on a bus, a booking ID, one of hundreds shuffled through a pre-packaged itinerary. The experience is built for efficiency, not connection.

But Atomic Trips is different.

Sabrina and Matt don’t just organize trips, they build communities. Travelers aren’t just guests; they’re people they get to know personally. They’ll remember your name, where you’re from,and what excites you about this trip. They’ll ask about your pets, your favorite foods, the kind of traveler you are. Because for them, travel isn’t just about the places you visit—it’s about the people who experience it with you.

It’s about sharing a meal in a tucked-away family-owned trattoria in Italy, watching the sun dip below the Cliffs of Moher with new friends, and walking the streets of Paris with strangers who, by the end of the trip, feel like family.

Travel changes you. It marks milestones, shapes character, and becomes a defining part of life’s journey. But too often, corporate travel companies strip away the magic. They cram itineraries with checklists instead of moments, treating travel like a product rather than an experience.

That’s what Atomic Trips was built to change.

It’s travel done differently—immersive, meaningful, deeply personal.

Here, you don’t just come home with photos. You come home with stories, friendships, and experiences that stay with you forever.

Because at Atomic Trips, travel isn’t just about where you go.

It’s about how deeply you experience it.

Know Before You Go FAQs