WATERLOO - Locally based Short's Travel Management said Monday it had acquired Colorado-based Groople Inc., an online group travel agency that offers online group hotel booking online with real-time rates and availability.

The cash deal was completed in November as a way to complement Short's Travel's technology and customer service focus, said David LeCompte, Short's president and chief executive officer. Announcement of the buyout, the price of which LeCompte declined to reveal, was delayed until Monday because the company had to bring in extra servers and hire a couple of extra employees, he said.

"There are several companies out there that do automated (bookings), but they're the only one that have a direct connection for inventory for hotels with four or five rooms at a time," LeCompte said.

Short's has focused on the sports market, handling arrangements for organizations like the National Collegiate Athletic Association.

Groople has technology in place that enables Short's to move into the large-scale corporate sector, LeCompte said.

"We're really in the right place at the right time to get the best technology in the marketplace, with Groople, and we're hoping it's going to help us, not only in the sports marketplace, but in the corporate marketplace," LeCompte said.

It's the third major acquisition Short's has made since it acquired Kansas City-based Passport Travel in 2001. Short's operates an office in Kansas City suburb, Overland Park, Kan.

Englewood, Colo.-based Groople, a combination of "group" and "people," was launched in 2004 to handle travel and hotel bookings for large groups at prices the company has guaranteed to be among the lowest available, often with free rooms, upgrades and other amenities to qualifying clients.

"We've been working on a relationship since probably March or April," LeCompte said. "The sports market is what kind of initiated that. They were first interested in (buying) us and we said we'd never sell."

But Groople has had about $20 million in venture capital behind it, and the company was becoming a compelling target for Short's to approach with a similar offer, LeCompte said.

"We were kind of working on developing some things jointly," he said. "It's just more difficult when you're separate companies."

The opportunity for Short's to buy up Groople came up last fall, LeCompte added.

An acquisition of Groople by another company "didn't come through," he said. "They pulled out and presented the opportunity to us."

Mike Stacy, CEO of Groople, added that Short's Travel's focus on the sports and corporate markets complement Groople's focus on group travel across sports, business, and leisure markets.

"Short's Travel moves 250,000 fans and athletes each year and coordinates logistics for over 20,000 meeting attendees," Stacy said in a news release. "Our technology will make booking travel even easier and more cost-effective for both travelers and our hotel supplier partners."

For the present, Stacy is staying on at Groople's existing office, along with five information technology workers, LeCompte said.

The group travel sector is hampered by an antiquated hotel reservation system that was originally designed to serve single travelers in the early days of the airline industry, and the technical infrastructure underlying widely used reservation systems such as the Global Distribution System is ill-equipped to automatically book more than four rooms in a single transaction, LeCompte said.

As a result, he added, group travel bookings have been conducted through manual processes requiring a high degree of human intervention.

"Groople has invested in the development of a wide array of online group travel products designed to automate the complex, manual tasks of group travel from a consumer, travel planner and supplier perspective," he said. "It's a tremendous time saver for corporations and sports entities and the like."

The buyout enabled Short's to hire a couple of employees, bringing its roster to around 100, LeCompte said. In addition, two of Groople's seven employees have been transferred to the Short's office at 1203 W. Ridgeway Ave.

Contact Jim Offner at (319) 291-1598 or jim.offner@wcfcourier.com.