Expa Travel · platform decision · Aug 2026
In every option, the content itself belongs to Expa — the differences are in where it lives, what the platform costs as we grow, who Expa depends on, and who owns design quality.
| A · Stay on Framerstatus quo | B · Sanity + Utvektheir proposal | C · Directus + Williamworking demo | D · Hybridboth contribute — a testable setup | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Platform cost | grows per locale ~$40–75/site + $20 per language |
grows per seat ~$120/mo at 8 editors, rises with every hire |
flat ~$5–50/mo — seats, languages & markets unlimited |
flat Same platform as C |
| Lock-in | platform No export, no URL control — fails Utvek's own filter |
double Sanity SaaS + custom editor code only Utvek knows |
none structural Open source, own database, ~5k lines any developer can inherit |
lowest Open stack, two suppliers — either is replaceable |
| Design quality | known quantity Current site, current issues |
repeat risk Same failure mode as the pre-Framer project; no named owner |
owned William owns it — parity already proven in the demo |
owned Dedicated design owner (William) from day one |
| Editing | Type-on-page — in practice unused by the team |
Click-to-field in a custom-built Studio |
Click-on-the-page editing — live today at cms.expa.no |
Same as C |
| Languages & markets | cost cliff Bundled locales, paid per language |
native Best-in-class translation workflow, stale-flagging built in |
native Unlimited; staleness tracking is a small addition |
Same as C, with Utvek running the editorial workflow |
| AI & SEO tooling | none | promised Shown in demo videos |
running now AI rewrite/coach flows, MCP, Site-health dashboard — 318 real findings in Expa's content |
running now Same tools; Utvek's SEO work measured on the dashboard |
| Exists today | The current slow site (Google score ~55) |
A proposal and demo videos |
Live: home + 169 tour pages, faster than production (90+), all content migrated |
Starts from C's working demo |
| If it stops midway | — |
unclear The unanswered question in the proposal |
safe Every month ships something live that stays running |
safe Inherits C's milestone structure |
| After launch | Status quo |
Ongoing dependency on one supplier |
Retainer at or below today's cost |
Two suppliers with a clean boundary — platform vs. content — keeping each other honest |
| Verdict | Baseline — both proposals agree it no longer fits | Strong translation workflow & capacity; costliest in lock-in and risk | Everything B promises, mostly already running, at a fraction of the cost | C's platform + Utvek's SEO/content strengths — worth testing |
Working demo: expa-directus-demo.pages.dev · CMS at cms.expa.no · social cards at /promo/ — all live now on open source at ~$5/month infrastructure.