The Founder of Lonely Planet

Interview with Tony Wheeler, :

Recently we had the opportunity to sit down with Tony Wheeler, the founder of Lonely Planet, in San Francisco. He was on a whirlwind tour in the United States promoting his new book, Bad Lands: A Tourist on the Axis of Evil. We spent about an hour in the interview.

Immediately following his book promotion tour he was off to attempt a climb of Mt. Kilimanjaro in Africa 5,895 meters (19,340 feet).

We asked him a series of questions - this is the interview.

Q: How did you decide on the Lonely Planet name?

We had done the first book and were just about to get it printed and did not yet have a name for the business. We had just seen a movie (concert film) called Mad Dogs and Englishmen.

It was about a rock'n'roll band on the road in the late 60's -you can still find the cd in shops. In this film with Joe Cocker and Leon Russell there is a song by Joe Cocker called Space Captain. There is a line that says "Lonely Planet caught my eye".

Oh that sounds nice, but the only trouble was they didn't say Lonely Planet at all - they sang "Lovely Planet caught my eye" so we altered it!

Q: Did you know early on that you wanted to be a travel author?

Two inspirations. One is I've always loved travel. I loved it when I was a kid travelling with my parents. I've always been fascinated with maps and countries. My father was working in a lot of different countries.

I lived in the states for a number of years, and the Bahamas. I reckon kids who travel a lot are those with parents who are in the army, work for embassies or work for an oil company. When I was old enough to travel by myself I was always exploring.

The other thing is when I was at the University the thing I enjoyed most of all my undergraduate years was working with the University newspaper. I reckon that a lot of people get into journalism and writing from University newspapers.

They are a great grounding experience and I really enjoyed that; I enjoyed putting the publications together. Looking back now I think its obvious; I would get into something that combines the things that I enjoy.

Q: When you were thinking of writing your original guidebook how did you overcome the risk aspect of starting a new business?

Again this something we talked about quite a lot. We had a number of years when it was a real hand to mouth existence. The business was very small.

You always look back and think you could have done that differently. If you know what was going to happen you can just go to the horse racing track and put your money on the winner. We could have done things faster in retrospect.

If we had gone to the bank and told them this would be a big business one day - they would have said your crazy! The very first year we (Maureen & I) both had full time jobs and then we went travelling for year so we didn't have any huge business expenses.

Then finally two years after our first book we finally started working full time (at Lonely Planet). The first 4 or 5 years was hand to mouth existence but we were enjoying it. It was fun to do.

The fact that we didn't make any money at it, didn't really matter. I think a lot of people go into businesses for themselves not just to make money but rather because it is something they really believe in; something they have a passion for.

There is a lot to be said for this. I remember my father once saying to me, your in your late 20's now, you have two University degrees, when are you going to get a real job.

Q: Was there a point when you did something that allowed Lonely Planet to really start growing - to take off. There was. We did our first book in 73' and it was a real business by 75'.

By the late 70's it was working - we had a few employees, we had a little office and we could pay the rent. It was a small business. And then we came out with our India guide in 1981.

It was nearly twice the size of anything we had done before; it sold at 2 or 3x a higher price and it sold far better than anything we had ever done before. So just on the basis of that one book we doubled or tripled the size of the company in one year.

We had a little more money at that point so we sent out a team to other countries (China) and we were able to produce thicker books.

Q: What do you enjoy most about being a travel author -other than the travel?

I've always enjoyed travel. I was thinking about this just coming down the elevator now. Part of what we try and do is to give people information and a lot of it is purely factual stuff, this is a good restaurant, that's a good hotel, but you are also trying to explain things.

This book Bad Lands I've just done - there is a lot of history in that. some of it is incomprehensible like what has happened in Afghanistan all those years; it is very complicated...and you try to put it down in a fashion that people can read and enjoy and understand. I enjoy putting things together like this.

Q: Which travel authors do you admire?

There's a heap of travel writers who I have really admired. Rory Stewart's writing I think is very good - refer to his Places in Between. There's another book on Afghanistan by Jason Elliot called An Unexpected Light. It came out a couple of years before and that was a brilliant book.

He got into Afghanistan - it was a suicidal thing to do and its amazing he didn't get killed. He then came back to Afghanistan again when the Taliban came in - the late 90's.

He was with the northern Alliance as they were sort of withdrawing. Its a fabulous book and you can feel his passion for the country. It was published 6 months before 9/11 and when 9/11 happened, this was the book to read. You realize why people have this passion for Afghanistan.

Q: What does it take to be successful in this type of work?

Part of what I enjoy is writing the books. I really enjoy the guidebook writing part of it. I don't do as much of that anymore as I don't want to keep going back and back (to places). The first time you update a book - you get the thing finished and done and your never happy with it.

And you always think, I could have done that better. When your updating a book its almost like you get a second chance and its always easier the second time around as you know your way around; there is less of a strain on yourself.

For guidebooks there is this sort of detailed driven thing - there is a lot of fact checking and its always intrigued me how... you get writers who seem like they are the perfect person for it, you've seen a lot of stuff they've written elsewhere and then they can't pull it off.

They are used to writing magazine articles - a week researching, come back and writing it up and in two weeks the jobs done. Whereas a book you know, 3-4 months on the road - its a whole different demand.

Q: What would you tell the next generation as they explore how to pursue meaningful work?

I think refer to what we were saying earlier - do something you believe in. Your never bored if you've got a passion for what your doing. I have to say I did once meet Bill Gates. I spent 45 minutes with him and you know, I don't think he set out to become the richest man in the world.

He liked computers and I think a lot of the computer stuff that has gone on has been from people who just have that passion...that old line about success is one percent inspiration and 99 percent perspiration. You know you can rethink that, and its true.

You've got to work really hard at it but you've got to have that 1% inspiration as well. You can work as hard as you like but if you haven't got that little bit of inspiration than your hard work isn't going to get you anywhere.

Q: How do you see your work as making a positive impact on the many pressing needs in the world?

I think that tourism in many countries - is the only industry. If I wanted to defend tourism I look at a place like Nepal - its a country I love and I've been back many times.

Its fabulous, you get out in the mountains and there is always a reason to go back. What other business is there - there's a bit of carpet making, there's subsistence farming and that's it.

If the family land has gone out and you haven't got a job you go down to work in India... and India is not a place to be an immigrant worker.

Its hard enough to be an immigrant worker in the States, let alone India. Tourism is what works there; its a positive force. I've done quite a lot of trekking in Nepal and I've done some staying in the guest houses along the way but most of it is just trekking (camping outdoors).

I've got a guy who writes our trekking book and anytime I want to go trekking I just call up him and he will organize it. Its that thing where you've got Sherpa's and guides and people who carry all the equipment.

You realize those people know they are doing a good job and they are getting a kick out of it and even though the porters are paid low, its still more than they would be making if they were doing anything else...and that's a positive thing.

Q: Do you have any charities you support?

We've got a Lonely Planet Foundation. We started doing it in the mid 80's; it was really the Ethiopian famine that kicked it off. We've been running it ever since. Today we are putting 5% of our before tax profits into it.

We've got a woman who runs it. We focus on the developing world - places where we have some sort of contact where we can manage (the money and causes). We also give money to organizations in general often for specific things. We've got a number of people we work with. I think we will start doing more of the things ourselves (charity work).

Q: Do you have any cute travel stories from your time on the road?

Oh I've got loads. One of the funniest ones was doing the book Bad Lands. I was in northern Kurdistan in Iraq in Arbil (Arbil is the capital city of Kurdistan) just wandering around the old town area. I came across this textile museum.

It was carpets, travel weavings, camel covers, baby carriers and other things; it was a really nicely put together museum. It was in an old Kurdish house which the guy managed to restore and it was nicely done. But I was thinking this is meant for tourists and Iraq is not a place where there is much of a tourist market at the moment....so I was really astonished by this.

Anyway I had a look around and there was a guestbook there... so I had a look at the guestbook to see who had been there. It was either aid workers or people from the embassies in Baghdad.

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