Suitesmile is 1! Thank you, readers!

Not gonna lie, November 8, 2019 feels like it was 3 years ago. What a long, painful year it has been for travel. And it is becoming clear that the road to recovery will be even longer and just as painful.

How it began

It started as a hobby, of course, before turning into a complete obsession.

This is the first time that I am sharing this publicly but my original plan was to start a YouTube channel, not a blog. And before it was called Suitesmile, it was Flying Nomad!

However, even as someone who made a living from filming and editing for the past 12 years, I found the process very unenjoyable and time-consuming. Finding royalty-free music was a huge headache too. I have massive respect for YouTubers now!

After just 1 video and 7 subscribers, I decided to cut my losses and moved to blogging instead. I am not the best writer by any means but what I absolutely love is photography and sharing my travel hacks with friends and family!

And oh, I originally wanted to call it Suitesmiles with an ‘s’ at the back but some troll registered that domain and was asking US$5,000 for it! That person finally let it go last month. I’ve taken ownership of suitesmiles.com and it currently redirects to suitesmile.com while I decide if I should go through the hassle of a name change.

If you have 8 minutes to spare today, here’s the one and only video of Flying Nomad:

This blog got a nice readership boost when I was featured by Mothership in January 2020 and I’m ever so grateful for that too! Just had to ignore the usual Mothership keyboard warriors in the comments section on Facebook. 😂

Struggles of travel-blogging in a pandemic

I went from travelling for a whole year to staying with my parent for 7 consecutive months. While it wasn’t easy to get used to it, I get that it is nothing compared to those who are losing their jobs and even their loved ones because of this horrible pandemic. That kept me positive to ride it out.

Nothing to write about
The problem with not travelling is running out of things to write about. The last thing I wanted was for this to be another “travel news” blog.

Readership generates revenue. But it would be a sad day for Suitesmile if some day, it turns from a travel hacking blog into just another smaller version of The Points Guy. There is always some sort of “news” to write about to maintain a consistent level of daily readership to generate ad revenue. But it’s just not the direction that I want this blog to head towards at the moment.

As much as possible, I would also try not post reviews on low-value luxury travels. Where’s the fun in that, right?

I do share some news here but I have a higher threshold of what is newsworthy. I wouldn’t really care if Singapore Airlines retires another Boeing 777-200 or if a new Sofitel is opening in Batam 2 years from now. However, if one day Emirates decides to join Star Alliance, I’d be very excited to share my thoughts about it and share all the sweet spots of its new award chart!

Although it sounds unsustainable, let’s keep this site running on passion for a little while longer, shall we?

Relevance
Other than news, I could also write about staycation deals every other day. It is arguably the most relevant topic right now, since general travel is still difficult. Truth is, I may have done it if the staycation “deals” in Singapore aren’t as bad as they are right now. But more importantly, how do I call this a TRAVEL blog when all I talk about is staycations? Takes away a lot of relevance too, doesn’t it? 🤷

You may also realise by now that I am a value traveller. I sometimes get strange questions like “why did you choose to stay in the Sheraton instead of the St. Regis?”. Uhm, because the St. Regis costs 4 times more and offers an experience 1.45 times better, that’s why. 😬 As I have always mentioned in my sweet spots articles, it is absolutely okay to splurge and ignore “value” every now and then. “Value” is subjective anyway, right? But what is the point of having a travel blog that teaches you how to splurge on your travels? Does splurging really require “teaching”?

Since the start of the pandemic, I went through extended periods without a post, even up to a week. But, you should know that I am ALWAYS looking for travel deals and hacks to share although they are few and far between at the moment.

Revenue
I’m not sure if anyone noticed but Suitesmile no longer displays Google Ads since June 2020. It is very disruptive to the reader’s experience and I don’t feel like the ad revenue is worth the disruptive user experience.

I would also like to thank everyone who applied for credit cards and bought miles/points through this website. These are Suitesmile’s only sources of income that keep the site going.

What’s next?

I enjoyed my 2-weeks business trip to Malaysia a few weeks ago and will be going again tomorrow. I am planning to relocate elsewhere soon but there are still very few options around. The major countries/cities that I can travel to are Dubai, Turkey, UK and USA.

Of these few, Dubai is looking the most attractive because of its weather in the coming months and the fact that there are amazing hotels going at a bargain! The recently-introduced Remote Work Visa is fantastic for digital nomads like myself.

By travelling to Dubai right now, I will be ignoring the government’s travel advisory. Besides the 14-days compulsory quarantine in a dedicated facility (self-paid), the last thing I want is to burden my country and fellow residents by returning home as a positive case. Before making that decision to relocate, I will have to decide if I am willing to stay away from Singapore for a long period of time. At least till my Qsuite flight to Auckland in July 2021? Come on New Zealand Immigration!

A final thank you

Following the Telegram, Instagram and Facebook pages are massively valuable for Suitesmile’s growth and I would like to, once again, thank everyone who have done so over the past year. Okay, before this starts to sound like an award-acceptance speech…

Take good care and stay safe everyone. To the death of COVID-19 and many happy travels ahead! 🥂

Love,
Fai