Some interesting discussions here about magazines and websites so thought I would add my two cents worth.

I have been publishing magazines for about 12 years and they include aviation ones, horse racing and boat racing, and now motor racing. I think people give the internet a bit more credit than it deserves. Yes its THE place to go for breaking news and those online type features but we have found that nothing replaces the feel of having a hard copy of a magazine in your hands to read, and like it or not a full page advert for a company like Cigarette or Hustler has a LOT more impact than looking at in on a computer screen. For our helicopter industry magazine we are getting more and more advertisers coming onboard and more and more subscribers. For this magazine we have both a printed edition and a digital edition, which is available as a freebie for anyone.

The reason for this is people read the online issue, and then decide if they want to subscribe or not. We have people who have collected every single issue of HeliOps since Day 1, you cant do that with an online magazine. When I am sitting on a plane going from A to B or in a car going from Miami to Key West its much easier to sit back and read a printed copy of a magazine. I was in Hawaii recently and asked the people at Borders books in Honolulu if they noticed any drop off of people buying magazines, the answer was No, in fact they said they notice more people buying magazines. The other advantage we find with our digital edition is that people in far flung places like Afghanistan, Iraq and northern Alaska are reading it online as sometimes its impossible to get copies to them through normal mail.

I agree that the internet provides a logical solution for anyone wanting hot off the presses things like results from races, and poker runs etc, but NOTHING beats looking at a double page spread photo of an offshore boat out of the water, or the latest NorTech at full speed in a poker run. EVERY boat owner loves seeing his pride and joy in the pages of a magazine and if you say you dont then you are a liar :)

Internet presence is important for a magazine and especially these days when you can include video clips and interviews and instant news etc. Both the internet and printed hard copy go hand in hand to provide the best customer experience. One cannot survive without the other, and I refer to magazines here, not just sites like OSO etc.

Now onto advertisers. Every advertiser is different and has a specific target audience they are after. For example NorTech wants to ensure their magazine gets into the hands of those who can afford their boats, advertisers like Powerboat P1 and Class 1 want to target both the fans and those who have boats and would enter their series etc. Not every magazine is going to provide everything one advertiser wants so therefore its important to have a variety of magazines out there. I will use Powerboat and H2O as examples. I get people asking me how do we compare the two magazines, and my answer is very simple. Whereas H2O covers the "frontline" of the industry, ie: race reports on Class 1, poker runs, Hydroplanes, Jetsprint Boats, etc etc, Powerboat cover the back Back End of the industry primarily with their boat tests, engine features, technical features etc.

Powerboat does a lot of boat tests and they are the leader in it so its absolutely pointless in any other magazine trying to take them on head to head with that. With people like Bob Teague doing them then its a no brainer to leave it to them. We pride ourselves on our imagery from the events and that will never change. Powerboat used to have the world leader in photography doing all their best stuff but unfortunately he isnt here with us anymore (Rest in Peace Tom). Yes they still have some great photography but Tom was in a league of his own.

This economic climate sucks for any magazine and I personally dont see the internet sites reaping the benefits other than they can get banner ads for very cheap prices compared to magazines. There are some companies who dont have budgets to support the magazines and thats fine you have to do what you can afford. Even some of the big players have cut back, look at Mercury Marine, they used to be in every magazine you could think of, now they are nowhere. Will they start advertising again when times get better, yes I think they will. And then you have your stalwarts of the industry like Cigarette who still have full page ads out there and I take my hat off to them. Skip Braver still supports the industry in good and bad times, and that takes a dedicated powerboater to do that.

Have we had advertisers who have stopped advertising because of the economic conditions, absolutely. Have we had advertisers who have cut back - Yep. Will that change later this year - We Hope So.

Magazines have to make sacrifices so they can stay around. Like Matt said Powerboat used to be 100 plus pages, now they are a fraction of that size. We have shelved the mag for the majority of this year with plans to bring it back in December, as long as the support is there. With powerboat the cost savings of going from 100 pages down to their latest issue is substantial and why continue to run up the expenses when the ads arent there to cover them. Thats just plain stupid if you do and thats why we shelved H2O. Am I going to piss away $30K + each issue just for the hell of it, not on your life. Thats the fastest way to ensuring the magazine dissapears for good. I take my hat off to Powerboat, they are continuing on and keeping the mag out there, albeit in a smaller form. Will Powerboat and H2o go the way of Extreme and Hot Boat, NOPE. They will still be around but this year will see Powerboat in a smaller size and H2o on the shelf but coming back.

So thats just my two cents worth. Reason I havent bothered to mention Perf Boat mag is that after what they did to Eric Colby (a good friend) I couldnt care less whether they are around or not. But thats just my personal opinion.

There are some awesome people in this industry and its always fun out shooting their boats and meeting people but 2010 is a tough year and its not finished yet, but this industry breeds tough people, just look at Smitty, Augie, Patnaude and others. This is one industry that when it bounces back it will bounce back bigger and better than ever.

Cheers everyone and I am back to watch the Formula 1 qualifying for the Australian Grand Prix :)

Ned

Ned, I'm curious about a magazine's revenue base. What percentage comes from advertisers vs subscribers/ off the shelf retail buyers?

I agreee that the economic downturn is the biggest factor w/ PB. But even before this downturn, I heard a lot of people turning away from PB due to their content in the last several yrs. I think they need to balance top end deatures w/ articles the average boater can relate to....

Hey X,

I can't answer for Ned, but I can tell you that here in the states, subscription prices barely cover the postage for special interest consumer magazines. Advertising pays the light bills.

Also, at least here, great (and I mean great) sell-through for a special interest consumer magazine off the shelf is 30 percent. That means for every magazine that is purchased, two get thrown away.

I don't know the sell-through numbers for magazines such as People and Time, but I imagine they're substantially better. I would guess newsstand sales are a healthy revenue stream.

But with most special interest consumer mags, you put them out there in the hope of converting newsstand buyers to subscribers, not for the income for increasing circulation, which makes your magazine more attractive to advertisers. Which pays the freight.

It's a vicious circle. :drink:

X - Good question and Matt is on the button. Display advertising and paid direct subs are where a magazine survives or not. Newstands are in my opinion the last route you take.

Here is why and every magazine is the same. When you sign a contract with Aramark (big distributor in the USA for mags) this is what happens. First off we have to pay for the shipping of the magazines from NZ to St Louis, then we get charged $XX dollars per pound for them to send them out to their shops around the country. Then they get a 65% of the cover price for their "commission". Then the retailers can have the magazine on the newstands for up to $120 days (6 months). Then if we want any unsold copies back we pay for that. Its always sale and return which means that they only pay for the copies they actually sell, not the copies they are sent. Then and here is the kicker, Aramark pay within 120 days, SO from the time the magazine actually goes on sale over there it could be up to a year later before a publisher is paid and with all the different fees and shipping etc we worked out that you have to sell EVERY single copy just to break even on it. So as you can see its not the most efficient way to make money.

Not all countries are like this but Aramark is one of the main players in the USA so the areas we do put it on the newstands is primarily to get subscribers who see the mag. We have other ways of getting mags out there for distribution that cost a heck of a lot less but do get us into the hands of our target audience.

Subscribers who sub direct to the mag are a good source for magazines as the whole of the amount comes direct to the publisher, as does the income from display adverts and goes to cover the bottom line. Every magazine has a freebie/VIP distribution list as well, its just part of promotion of the magazine. I have a set number of magazines I will give away each issue and how I do that is up to me. I have done that here on this site and on seriousoffshore. Its just another part of running a magazine.

Its tough for any magazine to give every reader what they want and Powerboat is in that same boat. It all comes down to the Editor and what they think should be in that issue. Maybe the editors decisions dont gel with you, one way to ensure they know what you like is to email them and tell them. If they care about their readers then they will take it onboard and discuss it. But you also have to remember they are taking on the views of thousands of readers and not just yours.

Regarding subs prices Matt also is right, subs prices of some of the mags there in the USA are stupid. I know what it costs me to print my mag and ship it to the usa and if I charged what PB or some of the others do then I would be paying a subscriber to get the mag, screw that.

I will tell you that out of a $80 NZD sub for someone in the USA to get the magazine it is broken down like this. Six issues a year so thats $13and change per issue. Now postage is $7.95 per mag so that leaves $5.55 for the cost of the magazine and some profit built it. Its not a lot but the margin I have on it is acceptable to me. We publish a good quality magazine on good stock and we wont compromise on that and never will. How the hell some of the mags over there charge what they do for subs and still expect to be in business surprises the hell out of me. :eek:

Anyway hope that gives you some answers to your questions.

Ned

Guys,

You will not get a more lucid and accurate explanation than that.

Also note in his first post that he is using the HeliOps site primarily to drive subscriptions rather than raise revenue.

I was just in the liquor store, standing next to the magazine rack and noticed Maxim mag. I picked it up and thought it was one of those special photo issues or something. It was barely 50% the size of what it normally was.

If you think it's only PBM that is smaller, take a gander at the magazine rack next time you're at the store and look through some of the rags. Advertising is down EVERYWHERE!

Was thinking the same thing. As a long-time subscriber I was shocked how small it was. Interesting thread though.

BTW- Not all mags are shrinking. Some look the same. Some are growing. I do tons of creative that ends up in magazines. Fight! magazine is getting bigger and better each month. Why? because MMA is one of the fastest growing sports. Is this the norm? no, of course not. Point is- the drastic change in Powerboat -I would bet- is directly relative to the current state of it's content - the boating industry.

The arrival of this issue, was a sharp reminder of what is going on all around us. Looking forward to seeing PB back to it's normal size and perfect-bound self someday in the future.

I'm like most people it's disappointing to see PBM shrink to it's present size... I've been a subscriber since 81' or 82' and its a shell of it's former self.... The most unfortunate thing is I don't see it coming back anytime soon, in this economy advertisers are being very choosy with where they spend their advertising dollars...

My company is no different we've had to look at all of the places we used to advertise and select the ones that have the best return for the money.. That meant reducing the number of people we advertised with, one of the online sites we used to advertise our services with dropped their renewal rate by 50%. It was very tempting but with all of the uncertainties in the market and new costs to business from the health care bill that just passed were just going to do the ones that we know will work...

Funny but true! Maybe next month the magazine will have more content (I did not say more advertising). We'll see.

Smarty - Methinks you might be smokin da crack pipe :drink:

Unforunately the size of the magazine is dictated by the amount of advertising support one gets. If the ads arent forthcoming for the next issue of Powerboat then I doubt you will see them add more pages to it because bottom line adding more pages costs more in printing charges, and makes the magazine heavier which means more postage charges etc etc.

And re the perfect bound. Unfortunately a magazine has to be up around the 90-100 pages for it to be perfect bound, anything smaller it wont bind itself together and will just fall apart. Saddle stitched and stapled are the way to go for smaller pages publications.

Cheers

Ned