Double-Page Spread Story

      Pack your bags and get ready to fly. T-48 hours until you sit back and relax in a first class direct flight to Paris with a mimosa in your hand and a cashmere blanket on your legs. 
      What might have been a hypothetical “what would I do if I won the lottery” thought, just turned into a worry free, hassle free and all-round free possibility, all thanks to the Editor-In-Chief of thepointsguy.com, Brian Kelly. 
      What started off as a one man blog turned into a team of of staffers who dedicate their time to writing about all things travel from new ways to earn and redeem miles to must see destinations. The website’s main function, however, is to show readers different ways to maximize the points they earn from their credit cards by providing them with information on which credit cards to use when purchasing different items, such as gas, groceries or flights. 
       “Now a days, most frequent flier miles are actually awarded through credit cards and through shopping, not actually from flying so it’s really important that that people that want to travel are smart about which card to use in order to earn the most frequent-flier miles and TPG [The Points Guy] helps people with that,” Kelly said.  
       The TPG To Go application is an extension of the website that monitors what an individual usually spends money on and sends out push notifications on deals before they expire, due to the fact that some deals only last several hours. 
      “I have 25 credit cards and even though I know I’m on the extreme side of the equation, the app will actually tell me when to use each card,” he said. “Even an expert forgets that certain cards have certain benefits.”
      Kelly accumulated millions of miles a year due to the frequent work-related trips he took during his time working for Morgan Stanley, a leading investment firm specializing in wealth management, investment banking, sales and trading services in Wall street. The more he traveled, the more his understanding of the points and miles system grew. 
      “I was able to travel around the world in style, even when I didn’t have any money,” he said. “I was going to London in first class and Hawaii on the weekends for fun because of the way I learned to manage and manipulate 
and miles.”
      After months of traveling around the world, his family and friends convinced him to start sharing what he knew about points and miles to the public. 
      “I started a small blog and a year from my first blog post I quit my job and pursued it full time,” he said. “Now we have a million and a half unique people that come to the site every month and it’s been doubling in size every year. It’s truly been a dream come true.”
      Although not all points and miles are the same, due to the fact that they have different rules and regulations, kelly said one should think about them as a type of currency. Depending on the credit card and how the points or miles were earned, they can be used as cash back, transferred airline miles, or gift cards. 
      “We cover most of the major programs and in terms of the programs I think we have over 2,500 loaded in the system so pretty much every credit card, even ones that are no longer offered,” he said. “You can tell us what cards you have and we will tell you what cards to use to get the most benefit and value out of them.”