Gorbilet

About the company

I'm Ksenia, head of communications at Gorbilet. Gorbilet sells discounted tickets to events and tours. You'll find last-minute deals on plays, concerts, guided tours, trips, boat cruises and other cultural and entertainment events.

Our service has been around for 10 years. Every year, we help 500,000+ customers find great-value things to do in Russia and abroad. We operate in 10 countries and 30+ cities, from Moscow and Saint Petersburg to Rome, Amsterdam and Istanbul.

Our mobile app has been downloaded more than 1,000,000 times, and Gorbilet has over 1,500,000 followers on social media. Everywhere we go, we carry our core mission: "Make culture more accessible and free time more affordable!"

Life before Pachca

Until spring 2022, our team used Slack and was completely used to it. When Slack became unavailable, we started looking for a replacement. We considered different options, including Russian and open-source solutions, but the choice narrowed down to Pachca. Threads mattered most: many other team chat apps were ruled out right away because they didn't have them. The team wanted to move to a new service without losing quality. And we did: after moving to Pachca, we just kept working as smoothly as before, as if nothing had changed.

How Pachca changed the way we communicate

In essence, our communication structure stayed the same, and that was a big plus. Every process moved to Pachca unchanged. Same way of communicating, same chats, same sense of how and where to find the information you need. We didn't lose any convenience.

As for what's new, we now use cross-chat threads all the time to @mention people who aren't in the chat. Slack also didn't have group tags this convenient. For example, when we run a big promotion and everyone in a department needs to know about it, we just @mention @SMM and @Advertising.

Another thing that works great for communication is our culture of reactions. When someone tags a department with a quick question, the team adds a reaction to show the task is either accepted or done (usually 👀 or ✅). We use the same approach in other processes that don't need a detailed reply. It makes things more transparent for the team and keeps the chat compact.

Tips for making the switch

First, the most important tip: go with a team chat app, 100%, instead of creating a pile of chats in Telegram, WhatsApp* and VK. It will definitely pay off as the company grows and give you fast, transparent communication.

Second, feel free to experiment with your chat structure and don't worry about how many chats you end up with during the move. Try giving each department or project its own chat and group tag. Give each project group a chat and a tag too, so they interact more often. Anything you don't need will fall away over time, and you'll find the structure that fits your company best.

• Meta Platforms Inc. (Facebook, Instagram) declared extremist and banned in Russia.