A Quick TPG Update and Welcome to Nathan Richardson

There isn't a day that goes by where I don't pinch myself and ask, "Do I really get to do what I do for a living?"

Nine years ago this summer, I decided to start a passion project — a fun side blog on points and miles that I specifically didn't want to monetize with ads. The goal was to get people to use my services to book award trips for them. I used to charge $50 per ticket as "The Points Guy," and the blog was just a fun side project to help drum up business.

But soon after I started blogging in June 2010, I began to build a community as readership grew. In early 2011, I realized that my real passion was helping thousands of people via these blog posts, versus the handful that I could help one-on-one through my consulting service. Exactly a year from when I published my first blog post, I left Morgan Stanley to pursue growing The Points Guy — and what a ride it's been!

By spring 2011, everything shifted when an affiliate marketing company told me that if I used their links in the posts I was already writing about credit cards, I would get paid for each card my readers signed up for. No need to change my content or get it approved — simply use their link and abide by the rules, such as adding disclosures about my partnership in easy-to-read places on the site like you'll see at the beginning and end of this post and every other post on this site.

Long story short, the website started to explode. I caught the attention of national press and realized that I had a real business on my hands. In order to focus on content, I shuttered my award-booking business. (Sorry to the people who email every day asking if we will add that service — we don't have plans to do so any time soon, but our new app launching early next year will have a ton of tools that will empower you to maximize your miles and points like never before.)

Fast forward to today, which brings me to the next part of my announcement: our growth. This summer, TPG passed the 100-employee mark, and I'm really excited to announce Nathan Richardson as my Number Two and Executive Vice President of TPG. In this role, he will be leading our business strategy, product, marketing, partnerships and public relations. Simply put, he will be working with me to take TPG from a media platform to a consumer travel hub with indispensable tools that will help our millions of readers maximize their earning and burning of points.

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Nathan led Yahoo! Finance, which has grown into the number one online finance and business destination. He also served as the head of Dow Jones Online, overseeing huge media brands such as WSJ.com, Marketwatch.com, and Barrons.com.

In addition to Nathan's digital media experience, he has invested in and served as an adviser to several financial technology companies in the past. Nathan also serves on the advisory board for The Brookings Institution's Center for Universal Education and on the leadership council of Tech: NYC.

Most recently, Nathan founded and sold TradeIt, Inc., a set of patent pending technologies that enable retail investing, and cofounded #waywire with Sen. Cory Booker. Nathan also built and served as the President of Gilt City, a subsidiary of Gilt Groupe, Inc., leading the launch of GiltMAN.

In his new role, Nathan will help supercharge TPG to the next level, diversifying the company into new partnerships, industries and markets. He'll be serving as a key leader in expanding TPG's travel portfolio, running the day-to-day business operations and performance as well as developing the marketing, customer experience and analytics teams.

In return, I'm confident we will supercharge Nathan's points and miles game.

You can send Nathan your ideas for TPG by adding him on LinkedIn.

We've also hired Richard Kerr as our new head of community, and his team is working on some amazing ideas around hosting more TPG events and seminars across the US, UK and beyond. If you haven't already, join our Facebook Lounge, and follow TPG (and me!) on Instagram.

This is an exciting time for TPG, especially if you're a reader. We are still committed to creating rich content that will make you the smartest one of your group of friends — well, at least around travel and points — with new podcasts, vlogs and social channels launching soon.

It's been a wild nine years, but I am most looking forward to what's to come. We've assembled a world class team of not only miles and points nerds, but also data scientists, marketers, developers, podcasters and pups! 2019 has been about building the team and product that will define us through what I'm sure will be the roaring 20s! Whether you're a daily reader or someone who recently stumbled upon the site via a Google search — buckle up and enjoy the ride!

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Feature photo by The Points Guy.