PointsHound closes seed round as it offers airline miles for hotel stays

PointsHound, a startup that awards travelers airline miles when they book hotel stays, picked up $425,000 in funding in a seed round that included former executives from Expedia, Hotwire and Travelocity.

Funders included Erik Blachford, former CEO of Expedia; Spencer Rascoff, CEO of Zillow and co-founder of Hotwire.com; and Paul Nelson, former president of Travelocity Global Partner Marketing, among others.

Why would airlines want to award travelers when they stay at hotels? Because they get money to do so.

“Pointshound pays its airline partners for the miles and is becoming a significant revenue partner for airlines, similar to partnerships frequent flyer programs have enjoyed with their co-branded credit card partners,” a spokesperson says.

San Francisco-based PointsHound, which debuted in November, also offers points from participating hotels.

PountsHound doesn’t have the field to itself. Chicago-based RocketMiles offers a similar service.