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Topic: Travel writers: Press junkets?
| Author | Message |
| tomby66 | Posted – 6/19/2007 4:24:18 PM | show profile A query for anyone out there who does travel writing: How do the travel magazines and newspapers feel about press junkets?where journalists are invited to tour a destiantion (usually by the local convention and visitors bureau). For a freelancer such as myself, it's obviously be a good way to check out new locales without being sent by a publication. But I worry that some publications?esp. newspapers?will have conflict-of-interest concerns. After all, these trips are usually all-expenses-paid. Does anyone have experience with this? |
| kitchen_ink | Posted – 6/19/2007 5:39:25 PM | show profile It all depends Some publications have a policy that they don't accept press trips, others will take pitches that involve a press junket. If you do decide to take a press junket trip, I suggest securing at least one publication before you go. That will relieve the stress of trying to place the story when you get back b/c the pr reps will be checking in to see when their destination will be in print. |
| Seafarer | Posted – 6/19/2007 8:19:44 PM | show profile | email poster Comped travel Most of the national magazine (National Geographic Traveler) and newspaper travel sections that I write for do not allow comped travel. In fact, I just finished a research trip for a new online mag that does allow comps, and my first comp trip was sort of a weird experience for me. I felt like a moocher. The places that comped my stay turned out to be great, but what if they'd sucked? It would have been awkward, although I would have called it as I saw it. Some freebies were arranged through CVBs (entrance fees to museums, parks, etc.) and those didn't feel as squirrely as the lodging. I wish my editors would just hand me a pre-loaded Visa card for research trips, and if I use it up, I use it up. I think I'd rather travel as a regular person and record my observations that way. Bottom line -- ensure that it's very clear with editors that some/all of your travel is comped, but be aware that you then won't be able to pitch to a certain sector of the market. ------ My Web site Family Travel blog NHRA drag racing on Fast Machines |
| anonymouse | Posted – 6/19/2007 9:22:20 PM | show profile It's something of a gray area. Many, many national mags, whether they own up to it or not, accept comped plane tickets, fees, trips, hotel stays, etc. The magazine industry practically survives on that sort of thing. Others have a stricter ethics policy, e.g. The New York Times makes all travel writers sign a pledge they will not accept comps of any kind, or even tell people they are on assignment for the Times. If they have ever accepted them for any story, for any publication, they are banned from writing for the Times. That's the most extreme case I know of, however, especially since the NYT pays far less than most magazines. |
| candylilacs | Posted – 6/19/2007 10:10:15 PM | show profile | email poster Actually a lot of magazines have policies against press junket/freebies. The travel piece I did for a national magazine did not allow any of that. |
| nika | Posted – 6/20/2007 4:04:40 AM | show profile Unless the publication has a specific policy in place, don't ask, don't tell. |
| maphop | Posted – 6/20/2007 9:17:13 AM | show profile While many of the major outlets don't allow their writers to take press junkets, the lesser paying, regional magazine often do. In fact, I've heard of a couple of rather well-known regionals offering the press trips as "perks" for their underpaid staff and/or offering the trips to freelancers as their payment for the story. In other words, if you'd like to go to Hawaii for four days, free, fine. We'll send you in return for 1400 words on the destination. All that said, and to address Tomby66's original question, you're not going to take the trip without already having an assignment, right? So, you've already answered your quesion; if the editor who's assigning the job doesn't have a problem with the fam trip, you're fine. What I can't recommend, even to a newby, is that you take a fam trip without an existing assignment; it WILL come back to haunt you, even if a desperate PR person, eager just to fill slots, invites you without verifying that you have an assignment in hand. Accounts change hands all the time as do hotel managers, PR people, etc. If you take the trip and don't produce (place the article) within a reasonable period of time, word gets out and your reputation is at stake. |
| woof | Posted – 6/20/2007 12:13:00 PM | show profile As the former President of a Travel Writers organization, this Press Trip issue comes up again and again. Without getting too steamed - I'll offer my two cents. A professional journalist - which I presume you are - has an obligation to see/experience and seek out interesting stories for readers. It really doesn't matter who pays the bill, that's besides the point. What's important is to be critical, fair, honest, sniff out a story - or not - and report back accurately. Many magazines and newspapers have a haughty opinion of staff credibility while discounting freelancers as worthless hacks and freeloaders. Untrue and unfair. Indeed, some freelancers do take advantage of the system - like in any industry, but the good ones (and you know who you are) retain a high sense of personal ethics. Go, experience, ask a ton of questions, take photos, go off on your own and come back with a great story. Please remember that writing, especially travel writing is a business. You cannot travel to Hong Kong for instance, spend $ 6,000 of your own money to earn $ 600 when you finally sell a story. That's bad business and an untenable situation. Staff writers earn a salary while often having all of their travel expenses covered. Besides, I can't tell you how many comped trips I've been on with others who then published in those reputable "no comps" publications. If you happen to be related, a good friend, girlfriend or boyfriend of the editor, well then, the policy is out the window. If asked, be honest at all times about the trip, but yes, sadly, sometimes the don't ask, don't tell policy is the way to go. There really is no conflict of interest, unless you are working for the airline, hotel or CVB. Don't worry too much about the silly policy of certain pubs. Try and land assignments, don't waste your time on frivolous trips but do take up intriguing opportunities as you see fit. It will pay off in the long run, both professionally and personally. Good luck. |
| tomby66 | Posted – 6/20/2007 1:25:47 PM | show profile Thanks, everybody, for the informed responses. I tend to agree with Woof that as a freelancer I need to get out there and experience places -- and that's fine, so long as I don't find myself writing about destinations that aren't of interest. I also feel that I could never travel on a junket where they EXPECT you to definitely write something. How could I commit to writing about someplace I haven't seen, experienced and judged for myself? |
| DHernandez | Posted – 6/20/2007 6:50:40 PM | show profile If you subscribe to "don't ask, don't tell," then don't get caught, either. |
| DHernandez | Posted – 6/20/2007 6:55:26 PM | show profile >>If you happen to be related, a good friend, girlfriend or boyfriend of the editor, well then, the policy is out the window. << I guess this is supposed to be joke, because it certainly isn't true. |
| JimmyG | Posted – 6/21/2007 11:59:12 AM | show profile I cover new cars and my largest client just announced that they would no longer accept road tests based on press-trip new-model introductions. This is the case at big-time papers like WSJ and the Chicago Tribune, who pay the way of their writers at such events, but pretty much 90% of all other mags and websites have no such restrictions. This also means that my client, who almost exclusively uses freelancers, will be restricted severely in terms of access to review vehicles, especially the most upscale ones that rarely, if ever, make it into the regional press fleets. It's a noble gesture, but if you've ever been on an automotive press junket you'll hear more whining about having to spend what amounts to two or three days (with travel) to essentially do a half day's worth of work. If you spend a great deal of your working time in airports and in hotel rooms (at one point when I was on-staff I got an invite a week for a car event, sometimes two or three at a time in the peak of summer) you pretty much become immune to what outsiders would consider to be largess. And let's face it, whether the tab is being paid by your publication or an automaker to attend a press trip or you're getting a car dropped off in your driveway, it's not like you're paying your own money for a $50-$100,000 (or more) automobile to review. |
| chucho | Posted – 6/21/2007 4:18:24 PM | show profile Junkets are highly scripted and they're awful. Most don't let you explore and go on your own. These junkets are specifically designed to show you specific hotels and activities, usually by getting the room and board comped by the hotels they choose for you. The daily routine makes a writer feel trapped in tour bus looking a "hotel inspections" all day long. I don't trust travel writing that originates with junkets, with good reason. This is also why many pubs frown on them, unless they're just interested in getting ad revenue from the airlines, hotels or tour operators that organize the junket. Most of the time these junkets are designed for the wealthy traveler who wants to stay in the Hyatt five-star hotel -- and that's all you're going to experience. It is impossible in most cases to find anything original from a travel story that's a product of a junket. It does nothing for other types of travelers because you won't have time to really explore a destination. This is why travel books in particular either "look the other way" or outright ban writers from using vested third parties to orchestrate your tour. |
| betsy balega | Posted – 6/22/2007 1:07:22 PM | show profile Comp Trips When i wrote Freelance Travel none of the magazines or newspapers would allow comp trips in their publications. Good luck. Betsy Balega Producer/Host Tuning in with Betsy http://www.blogtalkradio.com/betsy |
| Sam Waynewright | Posted – 6/26/2007 9:36:09 AM | show profile Press Junkets It's a myth that none of the big newspapers or glossy travel magazines allow their writers (freelance or staff) to attend press trips. In fact they do, but it is specially organised trips where the writer goes on his or own, and it is done very low profile. I know this for a fact, because I used to live in a highly popular travel destination (overseas) and hardly a week went by that some PR manager of a posh local hotel would not call me up asking if i could join her and meet a visiting (often famous) travel writer who wanted to meet a locally based FC. Nine times out of ten, the famous travel writer was staying at the hotel comp, and would mention in a very quiet way, that his or her airfare was being paid for by the national carrier. Thing may have tightened up a bit since then, but as far as last year it was still happening, and this including publications like the NYT, T&L, NGT and so on. In any case, even when the posh magazines send a writer from their staff or a freelancer and pay all expenses, everyone knows that the writer is from X magazine or from the Times and is there to do a story - that includes the cabin crew in BC, the hotel manager, the PR managers, and even the matre'd in the restauarants that the writer is recommended -- as he has been tipped off by the hotel's consciege! So it is really all smoke and mirrors, no matter what the newpaper editors or magazine editors say. The travel press in this country is simply seen as a kind of marketing arm for the travel industy. It's as plain and simple as that. If you don't believe this watch carefull the advertising pattern in magazines like T&L and NGT - there will be a wave of ads for one place - lavish two page spreads and back covers, say for example on Atlantic Canada. Then three or six months later, there will be a wave of editorial stories. A couple years back there was the same thing for South Africa. It as predictable and as natural as night follows day. Also, how often do you ever seen any bad news in a travel story in US magazines? Virtually never. Oh, of course there might be the minor mention of cost "this place costs the moon, but it worth every penny" but none of the normal rigiours that would apply to covering any other field. That's because, as I've said, its all about marketing and promotion. Did you ever wonder why, when glossy travel magazines cover places like Africa or Asia or South America, they only ever cover the same places over and over and over again, mentioning the same 5 star hotels, thats because none of the other countries or hotels can afford to advertise in those publications. This is a sad fact, but it is a fact. The only way that I've seen to get around it is to do what the UK and European editors do. The allow their most trusted staff and/or freelancers to attend press trips, but then they pretty much go their own way once on the ground, seeing what they want and doing what they want. And of course writing what they want. And, most importantly, they run a slug line at the end, saying "Mr. Mark Twain visited South Africa courtesy of South African Airways." This allows the READERS themselves to judge if the writer has been bought off. And I can tell you from reading many UK papers, that those stories are often highly critical of various things. This not only makes them more useful -- not to mention more interesting -- to the reader, that country's tourism board, its hotels and attractions all learn how to improve what they have. But don't look for this to happen in the US because the travel industry is far too comfortable with the present situation were simple marketing copy is passed off like baby's milk and is framed to appear like purely independent editorial written by writers who have not actually had lunch with the hotel GM and dinner with the tourism board people. |
| dribbledrive1 | Posted – 6/26/2007 11:09:28 AM | show profile This is an area with a lot of hypocrisy. Many publications will tell writers not to go on comp trips, but then not pay enough or reimburse for travel so there is no other a writer can afford to take the trip. It's pretty easy to take a high moral ground when you expect someone else to pick up the tab for it. |
| reporterwriter | Posted – 6/26/2007 12:06:37 PM | show profile I started freelancing by writing travel. The trick to staying clean is in the planning. I'm seeing an awful lot of freelance travel writers today (emphasis on "awful") plotting to get their spouses on CVB-sponsored trips by hanging cameras around their necks and calling them photographers, using sponsored trips as a means to get to exotic places and trying to write off vacations not only of themselves, but also of their family members, which the IRS would *love* to nail -- in short, finagling freebies to support their starry-eyed fantasies of calling themselves travel writers. The truth is, and was, that a writer can do a helluva lot without freebies by planning and knowing how to run the business. It is always possible to get an excellent return on a small personal investment, which, by the way, constitutes a deductible business expense. There is no reason in this lovely universe to play journalist while in reality shilling for a CVB. All this worry and finger-pointing over who allows staff to take sponsored trips while prohibiting freelancers from doing the same strikes me as ludicrous. Who cares? Sam Waynewright, above, describes the typical staff setup: directed, purposeful and with a disclaimer at the end, which is the ethical way to take freebies. It is a controlled environment intended to preserve the publication's integrity. Too many freelance travel writers, on the other hand, think like simpletons and act like jackals eager to become extensions of promotions and public-relations agents for the sake of getting free trips, justifying it by saying that, otherwise, they couldn't afford to do their jobs. Well, so far as I can tell, nobody puts a gun to somebody's head and forces them to work beyond their means or to write about whatever the CVB shows them. "Don't ask, don't tell?" Bullshit! That's an idiot's justification to brush ethics aside. "Don't ruin my little ethics-free glamour-status fantasy" is more like it. The irony is they have to keep it up to maintain the fantasy, because if they don't sell a story out of that freebie, they won't be be invited to partake of any more freebies; public relations people aren't giving away the farm for these writers' benefit, after all. Whether a freelancer takes freebies or doesn't boils down to a few questions: Why are you so deperate to write about places to which you can't pay your own way? Why not call yourself what you are: a public-relations tool? If you can't be upfront with an editor about taking freebies, then why take them? I'm not getting to Fiji anytime soon, but I'd rather stay on the moral high road. It leaves all markets open, and I know exactly who I'm working for. |
| Sam Waynewright | Posted – 6/26/2007 3:39:07 PM | show profile travel writers and press junkets Bbelinda is, alas, absolutely spot on about the flip side of this whole field -- the many deadbeats out there who pose as journalists. I?ve come across several over the years -- you can spot them a mile away; they write their notes on dinner napkins and use a disposable cameras, or don?t even carry one. And as Bbelinda says, many bring along a spouse or BF/GF who then poses as a photographer. And when you ask who they write for, they suddenly become incredibly vague. My question: how do these people even get on press trips? Why do Visitors Bureaus even consider accepting them, and which publication would ever want them to be their representatives? The mind boggles. And, as the Net becomes ever more potent, and print continues to decline, we?re seeing more and more of these fakes and poseurs, some of whom have cleverly launched their own useless websites, which they claim sees millions of hits. Yeah right. |
| Harbor Girl | Posted – 6/26/2007 10:09:39 PM | show profile | email poster NYT Travel Editor I'm getting ready to pitch my first travel piece and I'm learning a lot from the discussion here. Thanks, everyone, for your insights. I'm targeting the NYT, specifically the Sunday "Next Stop" feature. I'm in LA and have never written for NYT before. Can anyone confirm whether these pieces are open to freelancers. If so, can you give me the name and email address of an editor to pitch? Please share any experiences you've had with the NYT travel section. Thanks. |
| reporterwriter | Posted – 6/27/2007 11:24:49 AM | show profile Have you called the New York Times yet to get your answers, Andrea? |
| candylilacs | Posted – 6/27/2007 11:42:09 AM | show profile I know of one but he doesn't handle those features, although the feature he does handle isn't taking any more submissions this year. Bleah! ------ http://www.mswritesguide.blogspot.com |
| tomby66 | Posted – 6/28/2007 10:37:40 AM | show profile Wow, this discussion had some legs! And people are clearly passionate about it. Chucho says that all press trips are "scripted" and awful." I'm sure many are, but maybe not all? Does anyone have GOOD experience with a press trip to share? |
| ejlyman | Posted – 6/28/2007 6:16:25 PM | show profile | email poster Junkets are worthless In my experience, most magazines are looking for some unusual angle about the places they want reports on -- how are you going to get that from a junket? That's not even counting the ethical implications from your perspective (can you be objective about a place that paid for you to visit?), from the magazine's perspective (do they want to publish what amounts to an infomercial?), and from the perspective of the people offering the trip (how desperate do they have to be to offer a junket to someone who doesn't even know if a story will be published?). When I've done travel stories over the last couple of years I've generally refrained from writing about places that offer junkets -- even if I wouldn't be on the junket -- because it means I'd be covering tired ground by doing so. ------ Italy-based freelancer www.ericjlyman.com |
| ejlyman | Posted – 6/28/2007 6:17:27 PM | show profile | email poster Tired ground In my experience, most magazines are looking for some unusual angle about the places they want reports on -- how are you going to get that from a junket? That's not even counting the ethical implications from your perspective (can you be objective about a place that paid for you to visit?), from the magazine's perspective (do they want to publish what amounts to an infomercial?), and from the perspective of the people offering the trip (how desperate do they have to be to offer a junket to someone who doesn't even know if a story will be published?). When I've done travel stories over the last couple of years I've generally refrained from writing about places that offer junkets -- even if I wouldn't be on the junket -- because it means I'd be covering tired ground by doing so. ------ Italy-based freelancer www.ericjlyman.com |
| ejlyman | Posted – 6/28/2007 6:20:12 PM | show profile Tired ground In my experience, most magazines are looking for some unusual angle about the places they want reports on -- how are you going to get that from a junket? That's not even counting the ethical implications from your perspective (can you be objective about a place that paid for you to visit?), from the magazine's perspective (do they want to publish what amounts to an infomercial?), and from the perspective of the people offering the trip (how desperate do they have to be to offer a junket to someone who doesn't even know if a story will be published?). When I've done travel stories over the last couple of years I've generally refrained from writing about places that offer junkets -- even if I wouldn't be on the junket -- because it means I'd be covering tired ground by doing so. |
