SleepOut spurs travelers by launching Donkey Selfie Competition

Love donkeys? Of course you do, who doesn’t — they’re cute hard-working mammals with exceptionally long ears. And so, online accommodation startup SleepOut and HackerBeach are jumping the bandwagon (with or without the donkeys) by introducing the world’s first Donkey Selfie Competition.

Another exceptional quality about these mammals is that they are known for their traveling skills. In order to spur the nomad in all of us, SleepOut’s ambitious competition requires contestants to take a selfie of themselves and a donkey (real or fake) then post it to its website or Facebook page.

SleepOut CEO and co-founder Johann Jenson so-called “Aquatic Donkey Selfie”

Apart from the donkey contest, what makes the SleepOut standout from other Airbnb-ish type startups is the fact that it features all accommodation options from incredibly niche beach huts to all inclusive resorts.

Since launching in 2012, the company’s aim has been to provide Kenya’s most comprehensive online accommodation guide. After it raised a decent US$200,000, SleepOut expanded late last year and launched the online travel mag namely NOMAD.

It also moved out of beta September last year and has gathered over 3,000 accommodation listings so far expanding to Africa and the Middle East.

In order to create an unbiased judging process and keep things truly professional, world renowned donkey expert Vardan Hovhannisyan, producer and director of Donkeymentary: Life Through the Eyes of a Donkey, will be selecting the best selfie on Lamu Island, Kenya where the HackerBeach event is taking place this year. The winner gets hard-earned “serious braggin rights.”

You better get cracking because the competition has a weirdly short lifespan and will run until 14 January, 5pm EAT.