Rough Guides to offer free e-book with printed copies

Rough Guides is offering readers a free e-book version when they buy printed travel guides as the company tries to grow its digital business.

The programme will roll out on 1st April following a similar move by sister firm Insight Guides, which started offering free downloadable e-books with printed travel guides in 2016. Insight says around 100,000 people currently use the digital extras.

Rough Guides to Croatia and Iceland will come with downloadable e-books alongside Pocket Rough Guides to Rome, Barcelona, London, Las Vegas, New York City and Venice & Veneto. All titles are published in April and May this year.

Agnieszka Mizak, managing director at Rough Guides, said: “With the free e-book download, our customers get the best of both worlds – they can use the printed book when they don’t want to carry around expensive tech (which can be an issue in some parts of the world) or worry about their device running out of charge. However, for those situations when digital format is easier, the customer can switch seamlessly between the two formats, making travelling easier.”

The move comes after c.e.o. René Frey announced this month Rough Guides should become a dynamic travel tech company while not losing sight of its core book business.