F C U S   G U I D E S

About us  

Focus Guides is run by the British travel writer Andrew Sanger, together with his partner Gerry Dunham. Andrew writes and edits the site, while Gerry deals with day to day administration. The site was relaunched in 2007 after a move from online bookselling to online travel guides. In 2008, Focus Guides will also begin publishing books - guides, travel books and fiction with a sense of place - under the name Focus Books.

Our story

Focus Guides was created by Andrew Sanger in 1994 as an online travel bookstore, selling guidebooks at reduced prices, with free postage. He added the WebSight page, a directory of travel websites, gradually adding any useful sites that he came across in his work as a writer of travel guides and articles.

With the growing success of major online bookseller Amazon.com, and subsequently Amazon.co.uk, offering larger discounts and faster delivery, Focus Guides became less viable, and opted to become an online retailer for UK books wholesaler Gardeners. Eventually Amazon's progress made even this unfeasible.

In October 2007, Focus Guides relaunched as an online travel guide, building a directory of one-page guides to major cities and regions. The income comes from pay-per-click advertising and links to recommended guidebooks - which are purchased from Amazon!