Rob Burgess is the founder and Editor of the UK business travel and frequent flyer website headforpoints.com.

The website that I edit – is acquiring BTN from 10 October.  Malcom Ginsberg is moving into a well-deserved retirement as he reaches his 80th birthday, although for Malcolm this will simply mean starting a new monthly newsletter where he can share his thoughts on the industry to which he has devoted his career.

One position that Malcolm and I share, and why I feel we are a good partner to take on his weekly newsletter, is that most of the business travel media does not serve the real needs of UK business travellers.

This sounds like a strange statement, but I believe it is true.  Imagine your typical UK business traveller, taking 3-4 flights a month around Europe with the occasional long-haul on top.  Look at your typical business travel news site through the eyes of this person.  How much of the content is genuinely relevant to their day-to-day travelling?

Hotel companies love to send out press releases telling you that they have signed a contract to open a hotel in some obscure corner of North Africa in 2027.  Most sites would publish this.  Malcolm and I would both click ‘delete’.  We’ve both been around long enough to know that the chances of the property actually opening as planned are virtually nil, and in any event no-one really cares here in 2022.

The same goes for new niche flight routes served by airlines outside the UK, or orders for new aircraft by carriers that 95% of UK travellers will never fly – and in any event won’t arrive until the next decade.

Much of the business travel media only exists to flatter the airlines and hotel companies who advertise with them, or who they hope will advertise with them.  There is no serious attempt to filter content.

The print magazines are better, because the cost of adding extra pages means that there is more editorial control over what is run.  Too many people believe that because there is no marginal cost to adding stories to a website, they can churn out content of zero to marginal value.  This isn’t how the readers see it, I promise you.

What we have always done at Head for Points is to focus on stories that are of genuine interest to business travellers in the UK.  We cover hotels which are open now, and new flight routes which are already available to book.  We share hints and tips for earning airline and hotel elite status more quickly, which can make business trips far more pleasant.  We show travellers how to maximise their frequent flyer miles and hotel loyalty points, so they can repay their long-suffering families with holidays which match the style of how they stay when travelling for work.

Even if you work in the travel trade, this is the sort of knowledge that you need.  Your clients won’t be impressed if you know that a new Radisson hotel will open in Baku in 2026.  They will be impressed if you can show them a couple of tips to get a British Airways Executive Club Silver card more quickly, or if you know which lounges at Heathrow are the quietest, or how to get a status match from one hotel company to another.

For the last 10 years, Head for Points has been sharing this sort of knowledge with its readers.  We will hit 25 million page views on our website this year, 80% of which are to UK travellers.  Like Malcolm, we are winners of multiple ‘Business Travel Journalism Awards’ – five in our case, including ‘Editor of the Year’ in 2017.

If you’re not familiar with our content already, we look forward to sharing it with current BTN readers via their weekly newsletter from 10 October.  You can also see it online now at www.headforpoints.com.