Description
This session aims to address key concerns among working travel writers right now in a challenging travel media climate where budget cuts, stagnant rates, time-poor editors and overworked freelancers all collide to create a sometimes-unsustainable work environment.
With generous tips and insights from Sarah and Robin into how they work and what works for them as long-time freelancers, to on-point pitching tips and advice from commissioning editors Annabel and Meera, this panel aims to empower freelancers who are feeling the strain and pain of freelancing.
This webinar is sponsored by Adventure Travel Networking (ATN) and supported by Talking Travel Writing (TTW) – details below. If you want to suggest any questions for the webinar (there will be a Q&A during the live event too), please email travelwritingwebinars@gmail.com
The panellists
Robin Catalano is an SATW-, ASJA-, and Solas-award-winning travel journalist based in the Hudson Valley of New York. A New Englander by birth and a Spaniard by marriage, she specialises in coastal travel, outdoor recreation, conservation, human culture, food and drink, and hidden history. Her work has appeared in the New York Times, Washington Post, National Geographic, Travel + Leisure, Smithsonian, Afar, Condé Nast Traveler, Robb Report, Food & Wine, BBC and many more international publications.
Website: robinwriter.com
Follow on LinkedIn and Instagram
Sarah Gillespie is a multi-award-winning freelance travel writer based in Glasgow, Scotland, with bylines in The Times, The Guardian, National Geographic Traveller and Travel + Leisure. She’s also an East Asia travel expert, due to her Filipina heritage and extensive travels around the region. Most recently, she’s the author of the Travel Pitching Index, a resource containing all the information you need to pitch 37 travel publications in 12 countries around the world.
Website: sarahjcgillespie.com
Follow on LinkedIn and Instagram
Annabel Grossman is Global Travel Editor at The Independent. She joined The Independent in January 2022 as Associate Editor and has held the title of Global Travel Editor since October 2023. She’s lived and worked across the world, with long periods in India, Spain, Mexico and seven years in the USA based in New York, with a particular interest in exploring lesser-known regions and uncovering how travel can be a positive force for the communities she visits. Annabel also loves adventure travel, including mountaineering, skiing, trail running (and anything that involves a bit of adrenaline).
Website: independent.co.uk
Follow on LinkedIn and Instagram
Meera Dattani is the founder of Travel Writing Webinars, executive editor at Adventure.com, and a freelance travel and culture journalist with bylines in Condé Nast Traveller, National Geographic Traveller, GreenTraveller, Travel Weekly, Olive magazine, and others. Former Chair and Events Director of the British Guild of Travel Writers, she is also a mentor, awards judge, and a speaker and moderator on external panels about travel writing, DEI and the travel industry.
Website: meeradattani.com
Follow on LinkedIn and Instagram
*
This is the 11th in a series of informal webinars aimed at travel writers. This session is sponsored by Adventure Travel Networking (ATN), an award-winning organisation founded by Pru Goudie that promotes adventure and experiential travel with a positive impact. As well as an annual two-day hybrid Conference & Marketplace in London each February, the twice-a-year spring/autumn ATN Media Meet-up connects the adventure travel community with key travel media during an informal networking event with a panel session. If you write about positive impact adventure/experiential travel, contact Pru here. Follow ATN on LinkedIn.
The webinar is also supported by Talking Travel Writing. TTW is a Substack newsletter that promises to demystify the travel media for freelancers forging a career in travel writing. Follow on LinkedIn, Instagram and Facebook.
*
If you’ve missed previous webinars, you can watch past sessions on topics such as how to be a better ‘sustainable travel’ journalist, writing sparkling copy that gets you re-commissioned, using data and trends in travel writing, and better mental health and wellbeing (free webinar). All events are available here.
