AROUND THE WORLD AT THE GLOBE
We’re excited to announce that the 2026 BGTW Annual Gala Awards Dinner will take place at the Underglobe,
at Shakespeare’s Globe, Bankside, London. The venue is immersive and unique and promises to be a standout
setting for our event of the year. As usual, held on the eve of WTM, Monday, 2nd November.
As many of you know, every year we celebrate our Members’ Excellence Awards and International Tourism
Awards on the eve of WTM London. And just as a reminder, the British Guild of Travel Writers is the UK’s leading membership organisation for travel media with 220+ top-tier travel writers, authors, photographers, bloggers, and broadcasters – so it’s a good, well-travelled crowd with fantastic reach.
We hope you will join us, put your brand front and centre, and partner on an award. Reminder: We are the only media organisation in the UK to award our winning members with a financial prize.
14 INDIVIDUAL MEMBERS’ EXCELLENCE AWARD CATEGORIES:
- Travel Feature of the Year – UK (Reserved)
This award recognises written travel features that focus on the UK (England, Scotland, Wales and Northern
Ireland). - Travel Photo Feature of the Year
Recognising the photo element of published and image-led travel features. A feature must contain a minimum
of five images taken by the member. - Travel Blog Post of the Year
To recognise the quality of a single blog post. This includes blogs published on members’ own blogs or on
another website’s blog section. - Travel Feature of the Year – UK Regional Media
This award recognises travel features written specifically for UK regional media. - Travel Narrative Book of the Year
This award is open to written travel narrative books (other than guidebooks) published as a book between 1
August 2024 and 31 July 2026 (two-year period). - Travel Broadcast of the Year
In this category, a single broadcast can be entered by a member acting as presenter, director or producer, who is the sole contributor to the show, and who owns the content of the broadcast. - Travel Feature of the Year – Europe
This award recognises written travel features that focus on Europe (non-UK and including the Isle of Man and
the Channel Islands). - Travel Feature of the Year – Wider World (Reserved)
Recognising written travel features that focus on the wider world outside of Europe. - Travel Feature of the Year – Travel Trade Media
Travel features written specifically for travel trade media (i.e. non-consumer). - Specialist Travel Feature of the Year (Reserved)
For written travel features that focus specifically on food, wellness, cruise, safari, family travel or any niche
specialist travel sector not covered by any of our other categories. - Journey Feature of the Year
An award that recognises features clearly centred around the journey itself. For example, a road or rail trip, a
trip made by bike, air, on foot or by any other self-propelled means. - Travel Guidebook of the Year (Reserved)
This award is open to written travel guidebooks published as a book between 1 August 2024 and 31 July 2026
(two-year period) and not entered in this category before. - Sustainability Feature of the Year
This award category recognises pieces of work (written feature, photo story, podcast, broadcast or blog post)
centred around, and championing, projects and tourism experiences rooted in genuinely sustainable practices. - Celebrating Diversity Through Storytelling (Reserved)
This award recognises a single piece of media (written feature, photo story, podcast, broadcast or blog post)
that centres around diversity, inclusivity and equality.
To reserve your preferred category and book your award, contact [email protected]
What’s included for partners?
- An invitation to our event of the year, worth £249 plus VAT, is included with each single award sponsorship. This includes a champagne reception, three-course sit-down meal with wine and coffee, entertainment, networking and a chance to win some great prizes in our charity raffle, plus a take-home gift.
- Each sponsor has a slide with their name, destination images and logo in lights on the big screen. They also receive a news story with a destination image in our website newsletter.
- On-stage presentation of the award to the winner by your representative.
- Your logo on the certificate and a picture with the winner.
- We run a social media campaign in the run-up to the AGAD, where posts and reels will capture your sponsorship/brand on all our social channels. Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook and Instagram.
- Post-party coverage, including name-checks of our valued sponsors on our website and socials.
- Raffle prizes are also an option for sponsors – e.g. ‘win a trip to Scotland’ with proceeds going to our charity partner. It’s another visibility option for sponsors, with a large-screen promo of your brand and the prize inclusions.
THREE INTERNATIONAL TOURISM AWARDS
For over 40 years, the ITA’s have been celebrating recently opened, small and upcoming tourism projects across the globe. Projects are nominated and voted on by our media membership, with certificates presented at the Gala Awards Dinner. The partner for these awards has a prime and extended promotion window at the Gala, hosts media members at their table, and promotes their own attraction via a video, all while enjoying the kudos of supporting smaller attractions. We believe this would be an excellent opportunity to celebrate any destination or brand.
Sponsor/Partner the ITAs
Sponsorship of the International Tourism Awards gives you the opportunity to have a brand presence across each of the three ITA categories. As a sponsor/partner, you will receive:
• The ITA section of the evening (roughly six minutes) is branded and presented in partnership with your brand or destination; this includes:
- 60-second video shown at the start of the section
- 270-degree immersive video of your brand/destination shown throughout the ITA section and logo/branding
- Your representative presenting certificates on stage
- Logo on all ITA certificates (both for the winner and finalists presented on the night, and the 30+ merit certificates which are sent to all the longlist attractions).
• An included hosted table at the Gala dinner (tickets retail at £249+VAT) to host up to two/four of your team and six/eight of our top-tied media members who have nominated and written about the finalist tourism attractions.
• Inclusion of your brand/destination in the Gala’s media campaign
- Pre- and post-event press releases and newswire, distributed to multiple journalists (within and beyond the BGTW), reinforcing your brand.
- Branding inclusion on the BGTW’s website
- Branding inclusion on BGTW social media posts pre- and post-event
- Opportunity to share a press release or marketing update directly with all our members in a post-event partner mailing update.
To partner with us on the ITAs, contact [email protected]
