It's been more than a year since the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, but aftereffects such as airport delays and fear of flying lingered throughout 2002 like a bad hangover. In yet another sign of the battered travel industry's ongoing troubles, United became the latest in a string of U.S. airlines to file for bankruptcy last month.

Most of the positive economic news fell into the category of not-as-bad-as-it-could-have-been, as when the New York City tourism office announced that first-quarter 2002 hotel occupancy rates were within five percentage points of those for first-quarter 2001, and a December 2002 USA Today article reported that sales of travel guides were up, albeit slightly, over 2001.

Both publishers and booksellers report that sales of guidebooks and other travel-related literature are better than might have been foreseen at the close of 2001, but still not as strong as they would have been. "The travel industry as a whole has just had a very, very brutal year, and travel books have held up remarkably well in that context," says Bill Newlin, publisher of Avalon Travel, which publishes the Rick Steves series, Moon Handbooks and Foghorn Outdoors.

Those in the travel publishing industry point out that it wasn't the unmistakable dip in travel in late 2001 that affected sales of books (which have never corresponded exactly to travel figures) so much as the recession that had begun before then and was exacerbated by the events of September 11.

"Not only terrorism, but a down economy has dramatically impacted our business, starting with the fact that Americans are flying 20% less than they were," notes Stuart Dolgins, president of Langenscheidt Publishing Group, which publishes the Insight guides, Berlitz phrase books and Hammond atlases and maps.

The weak economy has also hindered guidebook publishers' ability to keep their products up to date. "It's always been a bane of travel guidebooks that the moment you go to press, 10 restaurants close. There's been a bit more of that of late because the economy hasn't been steady," explains Paula Brisco, Globe Pequot managing editor.

But mostly, the gloomy economic climate has left consumers cash-poor and cautious. "We haven't recovered from the economy, and that has affected us just as severely as 9/11. There's been some comeback, but not what we were on track to achieve," reports Harlan Smith, book buyer for The Savvy Traveller, a 6,000-square-foot travel specialty store in Chicago. To paraphrase Martin Luther King Jr., we're not where we were, but we're not where we might have been, either.

Keep On Movin' Out

Still, recession or not, humans seem hard-wired to go places. "Travel is not going away," says Pam Swartz, founder of Cloud Nine Press in Scottsdale, Ariz. "Americans love to travel. In fact, many feel it is their fundamental right and actually expect vacations each year."

A vacation is one thing, but Americans are much less likely to hop on a plane for business reasons than they were pre-9/11. According to Sally Scanlon, associate publisher of The Intrepid Traveler, "We saw a recovery, albeit a bumpy one, in all our travel titles in early 2002. Since May, however, sales of our business-related travel titles have gone south, while sales of our consumer guidebooks have continued to gain strength."

"It's business travel that has really tanked," concurs Fodor's senior publicist Jane Glennon. "Leisure travel is continuing. People are just changing where they're going." And where are they going now? Well, mostly they're going back to places they've already been, at least according to sales of the various guides. Debra Matsumoto, publicity manager for Chronicle, observes, "Recreational travel overseas is rebounding slowly for the 'innocents' or first-time travelers abroad, but seasoned overseas travelers were only slightly intimidated. In other words, the intrepid remained intrepid."

"Right after 9/11, there was a sense of freezing. Everyone just gasped and stood still and held their breath," recalls Globe Pequot's Brisco. "Naturally, there was a drop in sales at the time, but what seems to be the pattern now for us is that international titles are creeping up a little bit. Destinations that are perceived as safer or 'classic' are still appealing."

Reinforcing this is a trend seen across the board: the percentage of a company's sales represented by specific titles appears to remain relatively steady. Or, as Therese Burke, sales and marketing v-p at DK, puts it, "The bestselling titles are re-establishing themselves as the bestselling titles."

Perennial top sellers such as guides to London, Paris and Italy are achieving strong sales. At Avalon, Rick Steves' London showed the greatest uptick in sales in the series this year. Michael Spring, publisher of Wiley, which publishes the Frommer's series, notes, "Third World travel has seriously dipped, but our guides to major European destinations have actually seen an increase in sales. Italy is up 25%. London is up 25%." Sales of the Frommer's guide to Paris were up 12% in 2002, and sales of the guide to France increased by 3.5%.

And then there are destinations that pop up on the travel book radar screen with no warning. Burke explains that in the fall of 2002, she noticed an abrupt jump in sales of the publisher's Thailand guide. "Sales increased by 15% or 20%," she says, "and it took us a few weeks to figure out what was going on." The answer? Another round of the popular TV show Survivor, this time set on the island of Koh Tarutao in Thailand, had begun to air on CBS.

Be It Ever So Humble...

In times of trouble, of course, there's no place like home—sales of domestic travel guidebooks increased in 2002. "People are traveling, in many cases closer to home, but traveling nonetheless. There are risks in everything, after all, including slipping in the bathtub," says James O'Reilly, publisher of Travelers' Tales.

There's one U.S. destination in particular that has clearly benefited from reluctance to visit foreign locales. "Hawaii is now the rage. It's accessible, safe, familiar. Looking at advances from books last year and this year, Hawaii is up 25%," reports Spring of Wiley/Frommer's. The series' San Diego title saw a similar 23% increase.

Healthy sales of books on domestic destinations appear to offset partly the troubled waters of international travel, although not enough to satisfy The Savvy Traveller's Smith: "There has been some increase in sales of domestic titles, although it in no way made up for what was lost."

Glennon at Fodor's sees patriotism in the domestic travel boom—"People are interested in domestic places because they want to support America." For the first time in five years, the Fodor's guide to New York City became the bestselling guide in the series in 2002. "Usually Italy, the Caribbean and Hawaii bounce back and forth in the top spots," says Glennon, "but this year New York went right to the top."

Countryman Press, a division of Norton, has long specialized in domestic titles. "We traditionally cover comfort travel destinations," says publicity and marketing manager David Corey. Sales of selections in the press's flagship Explorers Guide series increased anywhere from 5% to 30% last year. "Frankly, we've seen a pretty sizable and measurable bump in sales overall," Corey adds. "Our sales of domestic guidebooks are up 10% since last year," reports Spring of Frommer's. "There's an increase in travel to Alaska, for one thing. People are into safe adventure, and Alaska fits the bill perfectly."

Nature is clearly calling. "Among the few bright spots in the weak U.S. travel market is that visits to the national parks have gone up more than 3% since September 2001," notes Elizabeth Newhouse, director of travel books for National Geographic. In response, next month National Geographic Books will publish a revised fourth edition of its Guide to the National Parks.

Lonely Planet launches a new National Parks series in March with Yosemite National Park, followed in April by a guide to Yellowstone and Grand Teton. Publicity manager Cindy Cohen explains that the press hopes to add two titles to the series each year and sees the books as a "cornerstone for developing more titles for the North American market." Ten years ago, Cohen notes, Lonely Planet did not publish any books about U.S. destinations, but today it has 40. "The consumer market is asking for more U.S. local titles, and we're listening," she says.

Although they are not within the borders of the U.S., guides to neighboring countries Mexico and Canada are also selling. "Canadian titles are all doing well. We've reprinted our Montreal guide four times this year," reports Fodor's Glennon.

Elizabeth Stewart, buyer for Powell's Travel Store in Portland, Ore., sees similar trends in sales. "Mexico and Central America are still doing well. People are definitely starting to go to those places again, and our domestic travel is still above what it might normally be," she says.

Mitchell Kaplan, owner of the two Books & Books stores in Florida (Coral Gables and Miami Beach), has seen an upswing in travel to nearby Cuba. Kaplan cited the Lonely Planet guide to Cuba as a particularly strong seller, noting, "The kind of people who are going to Cuba are the kind of people interested in a Lonely Planet sort of experience."

Traveling with children—and even with pets (see box, p. 50)—mostly by car, was popular before 2001, and that shows no signs of abating. Chronicle's Matsumoto confirms, "After 9/11, it is my impression that family travel mostly remained domestic and limited to road travel. We were getting calls from the New York Times, among others, for items related to keeping the kids occupied while in the car." Frommer's is adding three April titles (Chicago with Kids, Las Vegas with Kids and San Francisco with Kids) to its family travel series. "One of the secrets is not finding new destinations, but expanding on the destinations people already go to," adds Spring.

Roxanne Coady, owner of RJ Julia Booksellers in Madison, Conn., sees a combination of several trends: parents returning to classic destinations with their children in tow. "In our community, we're seeing parents who have been to Paris, but now they're going with their two kids, and what kind of guidebook they would be interested in is altered by that," she explains.

Series: Still Serious

Series guides remain the core of the travel book market and, as such, serve as a barometer. Furthermore, in a weaker economy, there's a tendency among booksellers to rely on series guides rather than seeking out individual titles or books from smaller presses. "Stores have needed to cut back on the more marginal titles they used to pride themselves on offering and are focusing more on titles with high turn rates," says Spring. "The larger travel book lines have been profiting from that."

Several series publishers have reinforced their commitment to the category with redesigns. DK, for one, will celebrate the 10th anniversary of its DK guides in 2003 with a new look and a year-long, million-dollar marketing campaign. "It's a commitment on our part to support our travel books," says Burke, "but also a vote for the fact that consumers will continue to travel." Marketing will encompass inclusion of the books in The Price Is Right game show packages, a bookseller display contest and a sales kit consisting of a tote bag filled with sparkling cider, DK branded travel-size toiletries and a disposable camera. The Eyewitness series now covers 72 destinations and has sold 7,000,000 copies in the United States since its introduction in 1993. It has also spawned sub-series such as the Top 10 Guides and a series of phrase books.

Langenscheidt's Insight Guides also sport new covers and the response, reports Dolgins, has been uniformly positive. "Sales for some domestic titles with new covers—Alaska, Hawaii, New England and Arizona and the Grand Canyon—nearly doubled from pre-9/11 levels. We ask ourselves, 'What would these unit sales have grown to without the 9/11 dampening effect?' "

The Let's Go series from St. Martin's, which has led collegiate backpackers through Europe and beyond for more than 40 years, was revamped last year, with terrific results. "Our orders were 25% higher than the previous year," reports Lisa Senz, associate publisher of St. Martin's reference. Stewart at Powell's agrees that the redesign has been a resounding success. "I was pleasantly surprised that they caught on right away," says Stewart, who feared customers might not recognize the books without their familiar thumbs-up logo.

Avalon added its new Moon Metro series last May and has published eight books in the eight months since. Interestingly, the small-format, city-focused books were initially conceived as an electronic book project. "But e-books themselves aren't ready for prime time," says Avalon publisher Bill Newlin with some resignation.

In April, Rough Guides will expand its First-Time series, which debuted in 2002. These are pre-departure guides meant to be used while planning a trip, and Rough Guides marketing coordinator Megan Kennedy believes they come in handy these days. "In recent months, travel has been, at times, a nerve-wracking experience," she notes.

And the series just keep on coming. Mo' Media, a Dutch company that distributes through Consortium, will not only add to its spiral-bound shop-eat-sleep series, but will also start a new 100% series with attractively arty $9.95 guides to Barcelona, Brussels, London and Paris available in March.

In May, Abrams launches its new Style City series, designed around the hip, the hot and the stylish. Although the recent travel downturn didn't slow development of the series, senior publicist Caroline Enright concedes that it was on the minds of the editors. "The thinking is, maybe you're not traveling as much, so when you travel you want to make sure that you see it all and your itinerary is as focused as it possibly can be," she explains. The first two guides, on London and Paris, will be followed in the fall with titles for New York City and Barcelona.

Frommer's is currently developing its first color travel series, to be launched in fall 2004, a development that Spring counts as a vote of confidence for the market. However, he cautions, "Guidebooks are getting more indistinguishable, and if any series is going to survive, it has to make readers feel privileged by offering insider tips. It has to provide more than the brochures give them."

Safety First and Last

If there's a single message to be drawn from the shift to domestic travel and familiar destinations, it's that consumers want to feel safe. In response, after September 11, Globe Pequot conceived two books devoted solely to safety. "Travel Safe is a small feel-good book of guidelines with government tips. Safe and Sound is for travelers, but it's also about medical issues," says Brisco.

While travel guides have long offered general safety prescriptions, in today's fearful new world, some series are adjusting content. Avalon's Newlin notes that the Rick Steves guides already made reference to safety issues, and while that information may now be somewhat more detailed, "There's not a lot of obsessing to be done. If people are looking for strategies and want to exercise some greater degree of caution, they're going to look for sources that tell them how to do that."

Shelley Wanger, senior editor at Pantheon and editor of the Knopf Guides series, reports, "We've changed information about visas, and we've mentioned in the beginning of the practical section of all the guides that visas are now more difficult to get when coming from certain countries."

Glennon of Fodor's says, "We've always had a section called 'Smart Travel Tips' in the guides, but we've added some areas concerning safety and airlines." Fodor's also now publishes a book in its FYI series called Fly Easy. Glennon, however, sighs over an issue that plagues all publishers: "The airline stuff is changing practically daily." Spring at Frommer's agrees. "Guidebooks come out ever year, but this information changes week to week. We send readers to a site with updates of what you can and can't bring on the plane with you. We'll even update all the books to tell travelers that from now on they won't be able to go through security without boarding passes," he promises.

The Internet is good for more than just safety updates, though. Lonely Planet sees opportunities to expand its business with a digital stock photography library called Lonely Planet Images and other downloadable digital products. "We are increasingly working with other businesses to create and distribute custom digital and print products that leverage our expertise and experience in travel content," says Cohen.

Settling into the Armchair

Those who can't do, teach, it has often been said, and there appears to be a travel-publishing corollary: Those who can't go, read. One sub-sector of the travel book market that has not suffered from the dip in travel and may even have benefited from it is armchair travel. Coady at RJ Julia tells PW that while sales of guides were down slightly in 2002, sales of travel essays quadrupled. "There's no doubt that those sales were buoyed by a few select titles," she says, noting that the stores sold 300 copies of Linda Greenlaw's The Lobster Chronicles (Hyperion).

At Books & Books, too, Kaplan reports that travel essays are increasing in popularity, and he cites two possible motives: "There's more good stuff being published in the category, and if people can't travel, the next best thing is to read about some exotic place they might not be able to get to." Armchair travel books also have a greater sell-through rate in Kaplan's stores than guides do.

Crown publisher Steve Ross echoes those sentiments. "If people are reluctant to get on a plane and fly someplace, armchair travel plays a more prominent role for them," he says. Past successes in the Crown Journeys series, which features prominent authors writing about cities they love, include Michael Cunningham's Land's End: A Walk Through Provincetown (2002), now close to a fifth printing. Promotion often spills over from an author's other projects. "The release of the movie The Hours is driving people back to Michael Cunningham's novels, and we'll experience an ancillary bounce," says Ross. Future plans include a Chuck Palahniuk title on Portland, Ore., and a book on Prague by Bee Season author Myla Goldberg.

Houghton Mifflin adult trade publisher Janet Silver agrees that frustrated travelers may be sublimating their travel desires through reading. "It's a lot cheaper to buy a book than it is to buy an airplane ticket," she observes. One of Houghton's major travel successes is the annual Best American Travel Writing series, launched in 2000. "It got off to the strongest start we've ever had," says Silver. "The first printing sold through, and it's been a steady seller ever since." Silver acknowledges, however, that crafting top-flight travel literature, like travel publishing in general, is a tricky business. "The writing makes all the difference," she says. "We want writers to explore beyond the place itself, to what the place signifies."

In a market that appears to be tightening for the long haul, focusing on quality is not a bad idea. Other than making their products the best they can be, publishers are patiently waiting out the bad times. As Pantheon's Wanger puts it, "Predictions are hugely encouraging. One just has to hope that people gain confidence and that the economy recovers a bit."