How to respond to a summer travel crisis with James Stewart

Alessia Horwich (00:07):

Welcome to On the Rox, a podcast from Roxhill Media that asks some of the best journalists in the UK for their solutions to problems that confront PRs daily. We know there’s not a one size fits all way of communicating with journalists in the newsroom, so we’re going straight to the editors to ask them how they like to work with PRs and how best to stand out in their inboxes. My name is Alessia Horwich. I’m a former Sunday Times journalist, now head of brand at Roxhill. Today we’re going to be talking about how to respond to a summer travel crisis with freelance travel writer, James Stewart. So yeah, I wanted to ask you, James, why travel journalism?

James Stewart (00:41):

I was supposed to be a hard news journalist and then I went travelling, I sort of jacked in my job. I started on the Lawyer Magazine, jacked in my job, went travelling for a couple of years, though, oh, this is fun, isn’t it? Came back, was freelancing, doing editing. I ended up working doing a freelance gig in Ibiza for Ministry of Sound for on summer for four months doing a magazine there. And on the back of that, they asked me to do a guidebook and I segued into doing other guidebooks. And then before you know where you are, you’re doing newspapers and then here we are.

Alessia Horwich (01:17):

Living the dream.

James Stewart (01:18):

Living the dream.

Alessia Horwich (01:19):

That was it. Tell me about the worst travel gig you’ve ever done.

James Stewart (01:22):

Oh, how long we got? Look, there was the Wolf trip to Belarus where we saw No Wolfs. We did see a fox, which might have been more exciting if I didn’t have a family living in the backgard.

Alessia Horwich (01:32):

Well,

James Stewart (01:33):

Yeah, I was going to say. Yeah, right? There was the 43 hours oblivio flights. There was one to Azerbaijan as well where I landed, did six hours across the country to meet the guide, met the guide and the guy said, “Okay, we’re going tomorrow going seven hours back across the country.” So that was on a four-day trip. But the worst, the worst probably, certainly for PRs, and this is the one that’ll make them breathe into a paper bag and go, “Oh my God,” is when I landed on this island in Australian island. Oh, it’s Flinders Island in the middle of the Bastrait to cover a new walk. And so I met the PR, the local tourism, and said, “So look.” They said, “We’ve got a whole itinerary planned for you. ” And I said, “That’s great. As long as we can do one day on the new walking trail.” Oh no, no, no, that’s not actually happening.

(02:18):

We’re not doing a new walking trail. We just told the PR that’s something to say when they said, “Do you have any news?”

Alessia Horwich (02:24):

What did you do?

James Stewart (02:25):

Well, you find a story, don’t you? I mean, in all these things, your job each time is-

Alessia Horwich (02:31):

I’ve flown halfway across the road.

James Stewart (02:33):

I was there anyway, but no editor wants to hear. I’m sorry, this didn’t come off. They just fill it. You find something else.

Alessia Horwich (02:41):

So

James Stewart (02:41):

I found something else.

Alessia Horwich (02:42):

That’s a mark of a good journalist. We’re going to talk about summer travel coverage, specifically sort of news really, because what is other summer travel coverage like? Are you already thinking by the time it gets to summer, are you guys already thinking forward?

James Stewart (02:58):

Yeah. I mean, look, certainly newspapers, I think there’s still space for August. I expect they’ve got July absolutely sewn up now. Personally, I am thinking about September already. Mags are, they’ll be working on those September-ish. Long, long gone.

Alessia Horwich (03:15):

So the exception to that rule is travel news. And I mean, every year something big goes wrong in the travel industry. What is the story you’ve got on your radar this year for this summer?

James Stewart (03:24):

I think it’s probably a bit early for the jet fuel price bike to knock in, because that will affect flight schedules. I think we’re talking about cancellations.

Alessia Horwich (03:32):

That’s going to kick in the autumn.

James Stewart (03:34):

Yeah, I think so. The big one obviously is EES, which is the European entry and exit system.

Alessia Horwich (03:41):

Which actually is probably a bit of … Well, I don’t know if this is naive to set. It’s a bit of a dream for travel PR in the sense that they’re not going to be directly involved in that. Exactly.

James Stewart (03:49):

I mean, it’s joyous as well. I mean, in terms of what makes it a story, just this has been rolling on since April when the full rollout started. Everyone will know there’s been sort of six hour delays, missed flights. Now on the back of that, every journalist is primed for when summer holidays start. And this is journalism in heaven. This is angry parents. This is wailing kids. And this is for a lot of papers, it’s sort of EU ragebait as well.

Alessia Horwich (04:17):

So

James Stewart (04:17):

Perfect story for summer, especially when schedules are sort of slightly more empty in the new schedule.

Alessia Horwich (04:22):

One thing I was thinking that for travel PRs might be a challenge with this kind of story is that it’s not necessarily the travel desks that are going to be covering this all the time. No,

James Stewart (04:30):

No, absolutely. I mean, those ones are a straight sort of news correspondent. Yeah, so it’s a slightly different market. The travel desks tend to do, and this is where the sort of travel desk does come in. They tend to do it as consumer advice and they play it fairly straight and they will be coming in there, “What is happening? How long are the queues?” The news desks will be doing that. “This has happened. It’s a disaster. Gene from Macklesfield said, I missed my flight and the check-in staff were no good at all. ” There’s a caveat again to this actually. I expect most of the newspapers will be doing that. I expect the telegraph being digital first. They love a good reportage. So I wouldn’t be surprised if they sent someone down there.

Alessia Horwich (05:16):

The telegraph’s always had a travel news.

James Stewart (05:19):

Yes. A

Alessia Horwich (05:19):

Slant hasn’t yet. They used to have a travel news editor, didn’t they?

James Stewart (05:23):

That’s right. And now Ben has really pursued that. Sorry, this is Ben Ross who’s head of travel. And the hiring of Simon Colder was very much, I think about that, that positioning, this sort of travel advice, travel news and giving it real value.

Alessia Horwich (05:37):

So, okay. So we’ve got this crisis that’s happened in the summer. BS is happening. It’s going to go

James Stewart (05:41):

Completely explode in middle of July.

Alessia Horwich (05:43):

Middle of July. Right. So a PR can know that now, a PR that’s working for a travel brand. Luckily in this case, as I said, they’re not on the inside of it. So from the outside, what’s the best way for a PR that’s working for a travel brand to support a travel desk or to support transport correspondent?

James Stewart (05:58):

Yeah. I mean, I think one of the big things you can really do is data actually. I was talking to Greg Dickinson of the telegraph who was doing the travel expert with Simon Calder and he’s- That’s The Telegraphs new programme.

Alessia Horwich (06:12):

Sorry yes,

James Stewart (06:13):

The Telegraph New Podcast. And he was talking about very much, they’re really keen on data. Is there a spike somewhere? We want to know about it. What are customers asking? We want to know. That sort of thing. If we apply that to EES, where are the delay hotspots? How long are those delays? What sort of percentage of people are missing flights? Conversely, where aren’t there delays? Where are people just sailing through? Let’s call them the hot spots as opposed to the hotspots so you can have that for free. Where are people sailing through? You can feed all this stuff back certainly to the travel. These are the travel desks, not the news desks. And they will love this stuff because it becomes a way to riff off advice and a way to position themselves as a leading insider.

Alessia Horwich (07:00):

And I guess also if these travel brands have people on the ground in these areas, that’s insider insight.

James Stewart (07:05):

Yeah. And that’s it. And I think the challenge for PRs is trying to get that ground information back to themselves and then feed it through. So it’s keeping communication lines open for them, I expect.

Alessia Horwich (07:16):

With something like wildfires in Greece, travel companies that are Greek specialists or wherever else we’re expecting to see the fires, should they be talking to people on the ground about what preparations are happening and then feeding that back to travel desks?

James Stewart (07:29):

Yes. I mean, yes. I mean, you can see my hesitation, right? 

Alessia Horwich (07:35):

Their hesitation is that until there’s a fire, it’s not a story.

James Stewart (07:36):

Exactly that. This stuff tends to be very reactive. So until it’s a fire, if you said to a journalist, “We have got this in preparation in case there’s a fire, good for you. ” And there’d be a shrug.

Alessia Horwich (07:47):

But I guess if you’ve got that information and there is a fire and you can email a journalist immediately and go, “Ah, these are the things. This is what’s going on. This is why.”

James Stewart (07:55):

I would maybe keep it in your back pocket until there is a fire and then hit. I mean, look, with a lot of these things, especially these sort of hot button issues, press tens to react fast, especially when the Iran war, when that broke, so it broke on the Saturday night, didn’t it, the first bombing. So by the end of Saturday night, I think, certainly Sunday, the Times had pieces up. What does this mean for you? What is it safe to travel to the Middle East? Can you still go to Cyprus? All these sort of information. So it’s very fast reactive. So to bring it back again, it’s having that information in your back pocket so that if something does happen, then you can say straightaway, “Bang, here it is. We got this. “

Alessia Horwich (08:37):

This is our data.

James Stewart (08:38):

“This is our data. We can give you this person who is on the ground.

Alessia Horwich (08:43):

“Yes. So that’s another thing I was going to ask you about spokespeople.

James Stewart (08:45):

Yeah, amazing.

Alessia Horwich (08:46):

What kind of voices should PRs be pitching and what do they need to know and what do they need to say?

James Stewart (08:52):

Yeah, it’s different things. Again, I mean, if we’re talking, I mean, wouldn’t it be amazing if we had someone like the head of Tui, the CEO of Tooey coming out and going EES is a disaster for our company and it really needs to just be postponed for a year or two until the EU get their ducks in line.

Alessia Horwich (09:10):

Is being opinionated though really key?

James Stewart (09:12):

I think for something like that, it will grab attention and it will make a journalist sit up and go, hang on. For other things, because if, for example, we have the head of Tui going, ” We’re disappointed that EES is a problem and aren’t we all? “On the ground stuff, let’s go to the wildfire example. I mean, look, the real on the ground, things like hotel managers, fantastic agents, fantastic DMCs who really have that almost reportage insight and you can get access to them, get quotes from them. And then you get all those fantastic heartwarming stories that especially make reportage sing. It’s the stories of people rush from the hotels or Peter from Manchester missed his flight home because of a six hour delay. So the GM put him in a car and drove him across to wherever so his grannies wouldn’t miss a 80 year old birthday.

(10:04):

Is that sort of

Alessia Horwich (10:06):

Convoluted?

James Stewart (10:07):

Yeah, it was slightly convoluted. Other birthdays are available. But yeah, so you get those really nice human interest stories, which you can really … I mean, look, they just absolutely sing off a page

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Alessia Horwich (11:12):

If you were to pick up a pitch, I mean, I know this isn’t your usual fodder, but if you were to pick up a pitch with a spokesperson, is getting a written quote from the PR enough or would you want to just have 10 minutes on the phone with them?

James Stewart (11:24):

Yeah, I want 10 minutes because the quote tends to be such a generalised quote that’s just been pushed out for media. We all want exclusives. We all want that. And also just written quotes with the greatest respect to PRs. And honestly, I don’t mean any disrespect by this. Written quotes tend to have gone through a machine and polished and all those sort of kinks in the manner of speech get taken out. I did a thing recently for a Paradores Hotel and I got a quote from them. It’s for an FT piece and the quote came back and it was bland to the point of … Well, I was going to say, bland to the point of unusable. It was unusable. I couldn’t use it. And I felt bad because obviously they’d gone through several stages and had it cleared all the way down the line. I think with travel sections, they’re not trying to burn anyone.

(12:14):

I know there’s a PR thing of in crisis comms of controlling the narrative. I’m not quite sure that applies in travel journalism, not in the consumer side of travel journalism, maybe more on the industry side.

Alessia Horwich (12:25):

I also thought that with this kind of issue that it’s not a PR, we will talk about when it’s an issue in your own company, but if something big’s going wrong and you could say, “Well, look, my CEO can chat to you for 15 minutes about the kind of implications of this from their view.” And you don’t necessarily need to publish anything around it, but it’s great background.

James Stewart (12:46):

Oh, 100%. I mean, look, assuming it’s a story you’re already working on and it’s a story you’ve already got an interest in. ,

Alessia Horwich (12:52):

I mean, for reporters, for travel news reporters, so like Greg.

James Stewart (12:55):

So yeah, people like Greg, people like Kathy Adams on The Times. I don’t know would Ben Parker on the mail get his hands dirty with that? He might do actually. Yeah, I would’ve thought he would. They’re all going to hate me for this, aren’t they? But yes, those three, target them all. And the way to think about it is my CEO is prepared to talk about it. What can you offer? I mean, I know that sounds ridiculous, but just saying my CEO is prepared to talk about EES, wildfires, whatever it is, jet fuel prices. What are they going to say? What are they going to say that’s going to be interesting? Can we get a little teaser of what do you think because they must have a vague idea of what is the sort of thing that’s going to be said and just go into your background if it’s a story I am working on, say.

Alessia Horwich (13:39):

How about when something goes wrong within your own travel company? Has anything ever happened to you?

James Stewart (13:45):

I can only think of one example off the top of my head. I won’t name the company, but it was a brand new boat in the Galapagos, small boat, 140 foot, 150 foot, very luxurious. They had a problem with the stabilisers so that when we’re going between islands and they do the classic cruise thing, go to an island one day, you go overnight to the next island. When we were going between islands, the boat rolled like fury. I had this idea that, look, I’m a journalist, I’m here for work, you’ve all paid for your holidays. Oh, I should have said it was with paying guests. So I said, look, I’ll take the worst cabin at the front because you’ve all paid and it’s not fair that you should have that. So I was out of bed a couple of times as this thing was on the swell and so people got more and more and more cranky.

(14:36):

That’s a polite way of saying it. And at one point we went to shore. The crew landed 13 tonnes of ballast in there while we were, I mean it was like big effort, right? And they were a lovely crew. They were such lovely crew. That still didn’t rectify it. Later on when they ran out of Chardonnay, not white wine, just Chardonnay somebody shouted, there’s going to be a mutiny.

Alessia Horwich (15:02):

Just for Chardonnay.

James Stewart (15:03):

I know. Exactly. So it became affectionately known as the Chardonnay Mutany in my head. I mean, obviously the whole atmosphere on the boat soured.

Alessia Horwich (15:12):

I know. We’re laughing about it now. What a nightmare for the operator.

James Stewart (15:15):

And also there was someone from the company as well on board who was trying to placate this and he’s got a journalist there for the Sunday Times doing a, I think it was a 1400 word read. It was a DPS, so it was a big spread nightmare for them. Absolute nightmare for them. The hostess was in tears all the time. Honestly, it was toxic on ball by the end.

Alessia Horwich (15:39):

So how did they deal with that?

James Stewart (15:41):

So they dealt with it really well, the company. They said, look, there was a problem with the boat. It obviously wasn’t how we wanted this trip to be. I think they gave some money back to the clients. I definitely gave them right reply, but they didn’t at any point get into that defensive crouch and stop talking, which I think that is the point. As a result of that, I had a huge respect for the company. I really did. They’re a serious company who are apparent to go, “Look, we made a mistake.” Well, actually they didn’t make a mistake. They’re prepared to say there was a problem. And I think that’s it. If there is an issue, you’ve got to be able to say, “Yeah, look, that wasn’t ideal.” No ifs, no buts. And I think that’s owning the problem I think is an important part because if you do a but also having empathy for the clients, not the journalists.

(16:35):

I mean journalists just can it’s part of the job. It’s just get on with it. Stop complaining. Quite no time for Brimadonnas.

Alessia Horwich (16:42): 

How much explanation is appropriate?

James Stewart (16:46):

In that case-

Alessia Horwich (16:47):

Or just

James Stewart (16:47):

Generally.

Alessia Horwich (16:48):

Generally. I mean, if there’s a crisis and you’re saying, “Be upfront, hold up your hands.” But how much do you really … What’s the balance? Because I guess they don’t want to give everything away.

James Stewart (16:57):

No, absolutely. And I wouldn’t expect that. I mean, he’d love them to, but I wouldn’t expect them to because you’re not going to get in the machinations of the directors a nightmare and he’s doing this and they haven’t funded this. I mean, they’re just not going to do that.

Alessia Horwich (17:12):

For an issue that’s more widespread than an individual boat. So for example, when BA had that hack into their systems a few summers ago and thousands of flights cancelled, BA a huge giant corporate, what are you going to get from them? Not very much. But if something similar affected an individual company or maybe you were in the Gulf of Mexico when you’re doing when all the oil spills was there or whatever, what’s the line to-

James Stewart (17:42):

It’s almost like going back to the pandemic era, isn’t it?

(17:44):

Yeah. When the pandemic hit, those companies … And I think it brings me back to what I was saying about consumer travel is supportive. During the pandemic, consumer travel was massively supportive of the industry. They want the industry to succeed. I know that sounds ridiculous and I know you’re going to say, “Oh, don’t be Sun AI.” But it’s true. I think it is true. I’ve always felt that PR and consumer media have a really strong relationship because we tend to play straight with each other and we tend to, as Simon Calder always likes to say, “Travel is the industry of human happiness.” And so you sort of want the thing to succeed and you want a trip to be good. You really do. When the pandemic hit, those companies that made an effort to get clients out and they talked to us. I remember having emails and conversations with heads of comms saying, “Look, we’ve got a flight going over here.

(18:41):

We got these people coming out. ” And it was all really good stuff.

(18:47):

It was positive, good stuff. If a head of comms was going to say to me, “We’re not going to do that, that isn’t such good stuff.” So would any head of comms tell me that if they were going to just leave people in the lurch? I doubt it. So coming back to your hack, if for example, someone said, “No, we’re just going to leave it. What the hell? It’s only client data. We don’t give them monkeys.” Then yes. I mean, oh, hell, say that. That’d be amazing. Yes. Wonderful. Great, great story. Terrible for your reputation, obviously.

Alessia Horwich (19:18):

I Mean,

James Stewart (19:19):

Disastrous. I would like to think you’d be able to say in that example, obviously, look, I don’t know because BA is a massive company, this is way beyond my pay grade, but you would like to be able to think you per se, listen, when the hack was admitted finally, yes, we’ve had a hack. Yes, we are addressing it. This is who we’ve brought in. This is who we’ve contacted. And really do that rather than just doing this holding approach, we will let you know more. Yeah. It’s communication. It’s just keeping those

Alessia Horwich (19:52):

Going.

James Stewart (19:52):

Keeping that dialogue

Alessia Horwich (19:53):

Open. I mean a cyber hack is something that’s so relevant for everybody now.

James Stewart (19:56):

Massively.

Alessia Horwich (19:56):

It happens all the time.

James Stewart (19:57):

Happens all the time.

Alessia Horwich (19:58):

So you’re saying … Well, I’ve asked you, one of the questions I had was whether the dos and don’ts. So do basically keep communication.

James Stewart (20:04):

Keep the communication open. Yeah. And also, I mean, look, one of the dos as well I would say is in terms of crisis comms, act fast.

(20:15):

I mean, not knee jerk, obviously because a knee jerk’s only going to come back and bite you, but get your line straight quickly. Don’t sit and dither about this stuff because if the silence press will fill the silence and if something is happening, they’re going to write about it and then they’re just going to speculate. And if say, let’s go back to the hack, we’re going to talk to a cyber expert and they’re going to say, “What do you think’s happening?” “Oh, well look, they haven’t done this. They haven’t done that. This might be happening now so everyone’s data may be compromised and they’ll find someone to give a comment because that’s the job. You have a hole. You need someone to say something. So God, you surely want to be in there controlling that space and controlling sort of what is released and having some control of the narrative rather than just going, no, we’re not going to say anything.

(20:58):

“And also in the general crisis comms we’re talking about before, like the EES, let’s say EES does totally explode in the middle of July and the whole system melts down and people are sleeping in airports act quickly because this will be a hot button issue and stuff will be written about it very quickly.

Alessia Horwich (21:16):

Do you think that PRs could be preparing now potentially for-

James Stewart (21:19):

Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. I mean, get your ducks on the line. So I mean that thing of crisis comms wouldn’t tell any PR how to do crisis comms because honestly, rather than than me doing any sort of PR, I’d be a terrible PR. I’d be so bad, but I just think it’s a really tough job being caught anyway, but yes, get those ducks on the line so that when it does happen, you’re mentally thinking through what could happen, get it all in align. So when it does, bang, bang, bang, bang, and you’re ready to go. And

Alessia Horwich (21:47):

Then get your email to Kathy.

James Stewart (21:48):

And then get your email to Kathy and Greg. Okay,

Alessia Horwich (21:50):

James, we’re going to do the quick recap and it’s going to feel very recappy because you’ve almost just said three things, but what are your three essential bits of advice for PRs who either want to respond to a wider travel crisis or who are dealing with the crisis themselves?

James Stewart (22:04):

Yeah. Okay. So one is communicate. Definitely communicate, don’t go silent, act soon, act sooner rather than later. The other one is be as honest as you can. How about that? And maybe a final one actually is maybe tricky to know how to exactly to get your message out there. I mean, do you put out a general press release? It feels a bit speculative sometimes for crisis comms. I mean, the same way if something happens if someone puts out, your CEO wants to put out a press release, will it get picked up? It’s a bit speculative. So maybe target specific people. Who are the people who deal with this? Kathy or Greg or Simon or Ben, whoever it is, target, specific people. So yeah, act fast, be as honest as you can target.