Couple quit jobs to get paid £500 per Instagram post while travelling the world
A family who quit their jobs to travel the world got paid £500 per Instagram post documenting their incredible adventures.
Clare Fisher, 32, and husband Ian, 29, sold most of their possessions and left their old lives behind when they took their children from school and went off on their travels.
The couple, from Porthcawl, South Wales, waved goodbye to family and took their son and daughter to live in Asia, Australia and New Zealand.
As well as an adventure, they turned the exotic trip into a business, setting up as travel film makers and photographers, with themselves as the subject matter, reports Wales Online.
They are among a growing band of so-called influencers, harnessing the power of digital platforms like Instagram to attract sponsors like luxury hotels, resorts and clothing companies keen to associate themselves with their online lifestyle.
They had to balance the need to capture just about every step of their travels on film while at the same time educating their children and dealing with challenges like being held up by police in Thailand.
But what started it all was wanting to make the most of their lives together, especially after a close friend with young children died.
Ian gave up his sales job and after “six months of hard saving and planning” the couple set off with their children, six-year-old Kallan and Maddison, who’s four.
“I’d worked my butt off, like most people, from the time that Kallan was born until we left and I work away a lot, so I never really got to see the kids,” said Ian, who’d had a job in sales with a telecoms company.
“So, to be able to eat every meal with everybody, go to sleep at the same time, wake up at the same time, that for me is the biggest takeaway,” he says about their trip.
Although they’d saved up to pay for the adventure, the sponsorship made a big difference with just one Instagram post able to bring in £300 to £500 from a brand wanting to be seen on their
They worked hard over the nine months to improve their photography and editing skills, building on Clare’s studies at Newport Film School.
“We’ve come a long way,” Ian says, explaining why he thinks they’ve been successful in attracting backing from the likes of travel and clothing companies.
“In terms of a package deal, there’s no family out there that a brand, or a resort, or a tourism board can have your actors, your models, your film-makers, your editors all under one roof, and we go there and we put it all together ourselves,” he claims.
“People asked us, ‘How much of the time is spent with a camera in your hand or how much of the time are you actually enjoying it?’ Ian says, explaining their answer is that’s our way of enjoying it.
Ian and Clare Fisher with their son Kallan and daughter Maddison (Image: MEDIA WALES)
“We take it in just as much with a camera in our hands as we do through our own eyes and being able to capture the kids’ faces in front of a volcano or a waterfall, or a breaching humpback whale is just amazing.”
They travelled in Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand, Hong Kong, Cambodia, Vietnam, Philippines, Indonesia, Australia and New Zealand – and they've been asked by many social media followers about their highlights.
“We’ve all got different answers,” says Ian.
For the children, it was the theme parks, they say.
“We were lucky enough in our first two days to open Universal Studios in Singapore and we worked with Disney in Hong Kong, which was a dream of mine and Clare’s when we started, to work with a brand like that,” he adds.
“We were commissioned by Disney to go there, experience the park and they’d recently opened a brand new hotel, so we tried that, blogged about it, created content, video and photos and posted that.
“That has also led to us working with Disneyland Paris in December,” Clare continues.
“The kids don’t know yet, but we’re going to be surprising them on Christmas morning with a trip to Paris.”
Clare says other highlights of the trip were breathtaking views and the wildlife.
“Whales, dolphins, kangaroos, that was a real big one for us, as well as some of the landscapes,” she says.
“Some of the hotels as well, it’s luxury like you’ve never seen before. It was just ‘wow’.”
Ian with children, Kallan and Maddison in West Bali (Image: Clare Fisher/Media Wales)
Clare and Ian with their children, Kallan and Maddison in East Bali (Image: Clare Fisher/Media Wales)
Via Mirror