With our media roundup we take pride in our almost masochistic desire to trawl the travel media in search of something inspired amongst all the PR puffery. However,we often grind to a halt when we reach The Mail.
This week alone they have travel pieces by Nancy Dell’ Ollio, Melinda Messenger (married to Wayne – good job she didn’t go on an Activities Abroad holiday), John Sargeant, Piers Morgan (Antigua…man, has it got talent) and Beverley Knight. It’s Celebrity Hell.
But should we cover The Mail? They have an expensively revamped travel site with squillions of readers and judging by how many trips are thrown their way by the travel trade, they are an important media outlet.
Maybe it’s just personal prejudice, but they don’t help themselves with their roster of C-list celebrities with poorly written pieces and headlines such as “Cuba: Havana good time” and “Prepare for the Scilly season”.
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As a freelance travel writer – you absolutely cannot knock the Mail. It has millions of readers – far in excess of the Indie, the Guardian, The Times, or even the Telelgraph. Love it or loathe it, the editorial teams there know their readership and they know what they like.
I wrote travel for the Mail quite a bit and was delighted with the people there on the travel desk – nice people, easy to deal with, not remotely up their own rears (like one broadsheet in particular that thinks it’s you that should pay them to be published there)… and they paid really well.
The Mail is a tabloid in the true sense of what the word has come to mean (ie nothing to do with size these days)… and you need to think of it in those terms. And nothing wrong with that… I just wouldn’t compare it with the Times/Telegraph/Guardian… very different with a very different readership…