Reflection

Widely lauded (by no one of consequence) as “the greatest travel show that never was,” Tim Shields and Bret Vlazny set out to do just that.

It took almost no time, however, for the dynamic duo to quickly discover that making a travel show was not easy. Not only did it require a plan, but a message and point of view. With the highest of hopes and the loftiest of ambitions, what began with the intention of creating a travel show quickly devolved into a travel show about two knuckleheads from New Jersey trying to make a travel show.

At best, they had a loyal, cult following. At worst, they had a hell-of-a-good time.

Jack Will Travel 1.0

At its conception, it seemed easy enough: backpack from one wine village to the next throughout Provence, France in the search of free wine tastings, and along the way stick a camera—which was attached to a wired microphone, because they believed this gave them more legitimacy—in people’s faces and ask them ridiculous questions.

While a grand idea, it quickly turned into the Bret and Tim show (as a reference, scroll down to Deep in the Sahara). Now mind you, especially for you young whipper snappers, this was long before the days of ubiquitous high speed internet and high resolution iPhones. It was borderline embarrassing how much equipment we had with us.

The net net of what Jack Will Travel 1.0 provided was a lot of memories, a few hangovers, several new friends, and many parties generated by Tim and Bret.

Jack Will Travel 2.0

“Let’s take this a little more seriously.” That was the plan at least.

A Year later, Jack Will Travel 2.0 found Bret and Tim hiking along El Camino de Santiago Trail in northern Spain. Again, although armed with steely conviction and grand ambition, things devolved quickly.

Along the journey, tired of lugging an archaic camera around with them, somewhere along the trail they left their giant, heavy camera on the steps of a church. They assumed the person who found it would call it a miracle. A few towns later, after a long night of drinking at a festival honoring one of Spain’s countless saints, the two set out on their longest hike—24 kilometers in one day. Early on in the hike, they stopped for lunch and a glass of rosé wine. It only took less than one minute of unattended bags for their second camera, a hand-held, high-definition camera—to get stolen. The intrepid travel hosts were down to one Nikon that also shot video.

The upset was more than the two could take and they both went their separate ways. Being separated for only 24 hours, they reunited by happenstance in a small Spanish village and decided to ditch the Camino trail to explore monasteries famed for being the birth place of the Castilian language. A few days later they found themselves at the running of the bulls where it’s suspected a group of drunk Irishman stole the Nikon. Being that necessity is the mother of invention, the Jack Will Travel podcast was born.

Jack Will Travel 3.0: The Blitzkrieg

Instead of shooting an entire season, the plan was to create a trailer for what Jack Will Travel 3.0 could be, and then do an all-out Blitzkrieg marketing campaign. Ground zero for the European campaign would be Amsterdam. The Jack Will Travel team even hired a consultant, which for a hefty price, gave them three pieces of sage advice. The result was a Blitzkrieg marketing campaign that was not covered by every media outlet in the Netherlands.

And here we are, a decade later. To find out what these two travelers and cohosts are up to, click here.