From backpacks to business: the Wheelers' epic journey

In 1972, Tony Wheeler graduated with an MSc05(1972) from London Business School . As one of the School’s very first graduates, he left with a job offer in his pocket from Ford – ‘a business school type job,’ he joked, to a packed lecture theatre at London Business School. He and his wife Maureen, who was awarded an Honorary Fellowship from LBS in 2011, spoke as part of a special event in conversation with Professor of Marketing Rajesh Chandy. Tony persuaded Ford to defer the offer for a year in order to go travelling with Maureen, whom he had met a year earlier on a bench in Regent’s Park.

The couple left in a beat-up old minivan, planning to make their way across the planet to Australia almost entirely overland. “The intention,” Maureen explains, “was we’d get to Australia, work for a while, save some money and fly back to London.”

“But we had so much fun, and weren’t going to get back in a year, so we decided to spend a year in Australia to save enough to then travel for another year,” Tony continues.

Tony never did take up that job with Ford. Instead, he and Maureen began compiling their travel experiences into a guidebook, Across Asia on the Cheap, having spotted a gap in the market. “People would ask us, ‘How did you get across India? Did you take a bus? Where did you stay? What injections did you need?’” Maureen described.

“There was nothing available that really helped people like us – people who were travelling on a budget and wanted real information. So we just decided to write it all down,” Tony added.

The first chapter

Using a typewriter and typesetting, cutting, stapling and assembling the pages by hand, their plan was to sell directly to local bookshops. “Tony was the architect and I was the carpenter,” Maureen recalls, describing the long days she spent at the kitchen table constructing the books from scratch.

“We took the day off to try to sell some copies, and the lady in the bookshop said, ‘You’re not the usual publisher. Who are you with?’” Lonely Planet, replied Maureen. “Never heard of them,” she replied. “I’ll take two.”

By chance, that bookseller mentioned the young couple and their home-made books to a journalist friend, who gave the Wheelers their first publicity boost with a crack-of-dawn morning TV appearance. That early momentum helped launch a publishing company that has since sold over 150 million books, covering virtually every country in the world.

Chapter two – scaling

In those early days, Tony and Maureen continued to do everything by themselves, with Tony drawing illustrations for the cover and even sketching out the (now award-winning) Lonely Planet logo by hand. “If you’re IBM or a big publisher, you hire a marketing whiz,” he smiles wryly, “but we just did it all ourselves.”

Even the name Lonely Planet was a fluke, Tony admits, after he misheard the lyrics of ‘Space Captain’, a song by Joe Cocker. ‘Lovely planet’ became ‘lonely planet’ – and it stuck.

What followed was a remarkable scaling story. As interest in global travel surged in the 1970s and ’80s, the Wheelers found themselves at the forefront of a new wave of independent, information-hungry travellers. Their DIY methods eventually gave way to an international publishing business that pioneered desktop publishing, early digital travel content, and user-generated reviews – years before the existence of TripAdvisor.

“We actually pioneered the whole desktop publishing thing – going straight from the computer to typesetting,” Tony asserts.

Chapter three – lifelong learning

For the Wheelers, building a travel business also meant learning, deeply, from the regions they were writing about. Much of their early success was tied to destinations in the Global South, particularly India and later, Africa. These experiences laid the foundations for a lifelong interest in emerging markets – not just as destinations, but as hubs of entrepreneurship and opportunity.

“So much of Lonely Planet had been in emerging markets – doing books about the places no one else was doing,” Tony explains, “and we set up the Lonely Planet Foundation to put money back into those countries.”

Rather than imposing top-down solutions, the Foundation supported grassroots initiatives. “We only worked with projects that were already there – where local people had started something. And if it was good, we backed it,” says Maureen.

Chapter four – a gift that keeps giving

That ethos of grounded, place-based development has carried through to the Wheelers’ philanthropic work. Their landmark support for London Business School has come in the form of a series of major gifts, each one amplifying the impact of the last.

In 2009, they established the Tony and Maureen Wheeler Chair in Entrepreneurship, a role that has been filled by Professor Rajesh Chandy ever since. “It was possibly the first role of its kind focused on entrepreneurship in emerging markets at a top business school. That whole domain was completely new,” Rajesh explains.

That initial gift set a new academic direction for Rajesh, and for LBS. “It changed the trajectory of my research and teaching,” he observes. “It opened my eyes to the possibilities for meaningful, impactful work – especially in Africa and India, which were closely tied to Lonely Planet’s early success.”

What followed were large-scale field studies involving thousands of people on the ground, research collaborations with institutions like the Gates Foundation, and growing ties with LBS alumni who reached out after hearing about the work being undertaken. “We’ve been able to do research that, at the time, seemed risky and hard to pull off – but now we’ve shown it can affect the lives of many,” added Rajesh.

The second Wheeler gift led to the founding of the Wheeler Institute for Business and Development to expand the impact even further. ‘When we first discussed the Institute, Tony and Maureen asked, ‘So does this mean creating more Rajesh-type researchers?’” Rajesh recalls.

“Well, hopefully they’re better than me,” he laughs, “but what it has created is an entire community.”

Over 300 individuals – faculty, researchers, students, and partners on the ground – now make up that community, working across India, Africa, and beyond. Their collective work explores how business can be a force for good in the developing world, and how innovation and entrepreneurship thrive under different constraints.

Rajesh now teaches courses that take LBS students – both physically and remotely – into these developing markets to support entrepreneurs in under-resourced communities.

“It’s changed everything about the way I teach,” he enthuses, “and it’s brought people together – across schools, sectors, and borders – to tackle some of the world’s biggest challenges.”

A third gift of £1 million in 2023 has continued to support the Institute’s growing ambitions, including collaborations with the Indian School of Business, Columbia, Duke, and the University of Chicago. “What the Wheelers’ support has done is amplify the impact of original ideas from an entire community of researchers. And I’m so proud of that,” Rajesh added.

From trailblazers to changemakers

In 2007, the Wheelers sold a 75 percent stake of Lonely Planet to the BBC, completing the transfer in 2011 by selling the remaining 25 percent. Their story is now no longer just about travel – it’s about insight, scale and impact. It’s about listening to local voices, challenging traditional routes to success and creating new paths – not just across continents, but hearts and minds, too.

“When you do business, make sure it’s your first love,” Tony urges the audience, reflecting on the road he and Maureen have travelled.

Watch the panel at London Business School with the Wheelers here: Journeys: Maureen and Tony Wheeler