What is happening at EVO magazine?
Discussion
NomduJour said:
Car & Driver is $25 for a two-year print subscription - for an extra $5, get Road & Track too...
How good is C&D compared to the likes of evo, Car, Motorsport etc? Ignoring the US-focus for a minute, what're the writing and photography like?...because I've seen a £25-for-12 subscription, which is quite tempting as a replacement for evo...that or Motorsport (which is still close to £50)
Knowing little about the industry can anyone suggest a known entity which records monthly sales, and could we compare to say 5 or 10 years ago? I suspect this will unfortunately answer why quality has seemingly fallen.
This may be over simplifying it, but I guess cost cutting is inevitable if say readership has halved.
This may be over simplifying it, but I guess cost cutting is inevitable if say readership has halved.
I didn't say it couldn't be done, but it would take a big pair and deep pockets. Like I said, there are easier ways to make a return.
Re subs - I guess they like to suck you in with a cheap deal and then hope you won't cancel your renewal at a higher rate. Bit like car insurance.
The American market is a totally different kettle of fish but one I don't really have the insight to comment on further.
Whilst I admire Hilton for publishing his mag, in my opinion, it's not currently a viable commercial proposition. Hope I'm wrong but we'll see.
Re subs - I guess they like to suck you in with a cheap deal and then hope you won't cancel your renewal at a higher rate. Bit like car insurance.
The American market is a totally different kettle of fish but one I don't really have the insight to comment on further.
Whilst I admire Hilton for publishing his mag, in my opinion, it's not currently a viable commercial proposition. Hope I'm wrong but we'll see.
havoc said:
How good is C&D compared to the likes of evo, Car, Motorsport etc? Ignoring the US-focus for a minute, what're the writing and photography like?
...because I've seen a £25-for-12 subscription, which is quite tempting as a replacement for evo...that or Motorsport (which is still close to £50)
Road and Track is more in line with Evo, Car and Driver is a bit more like Car in my experience....because I've seen a £25-for-12 subscription, which is quite tempting as a replacement for evo...that or Motorsport (which is still close to £50)
havoc said:
NomduJour said:
Car & Driver is $25 for a two-year print subscription - for an extra $5, get Road & Track too...
How good is C&D compared to the likes of evo, Car, Motorsport etc? Ignoring the US-focus for a minute, what're the writing and photography like?...because I've seen a £25-for-12 subscription, which is quite tempting as a replacement for evo...that or Motorsport (which is still close to £50)
Again I’d sell the idea that if you’re interested, then if you have an EVO sub, then cancel it, get on Readly, and for your £6.99 a month or whatever get EVO, get Car, get Top Gear, and then flick over to the US link and read Motor Trend, R&T etc etc...it’s all there!
acme said:
Knowing little about the industry can anyone suggest a known entity which records monthly sales, and could we compare to say 5 or 10 years ago? I suspect this will unfortunately answer why quality has seemingly fallen.
This may be over simplifying it, but I guess cost cutting is inevitable if say readership has halved.
Hi Acme, if you can manage to hack through, a few pages back I think I relayed some basic figures of where the major magazines were in sales/circulation from one year to another. I make a simple assertion like you however: notwithstanding the underlying reason, there can’t be a lot of money in the pot if readership numbers are down. This may be over simplifying it, but I guess cost cutting is inevitable if say readership has halved.
It’s good in a way people from the other side of the equation are coming to offer views on why things are the way they are (skintemma, you are Meaden’s mouthpiece right?
), however I think there are two deep issues the likes of EVO have: 1) when you have any industry, i.e. a smallish one like the U.K. car magazine sector, where everyone knows each other, moves from mag to mag, pats each other on the back etc, then you’re in a cloistered, closed off world. There’s little fresh thinking involved. Honestly, it must bore anyone with a brain half silly each month to have to find a few thousand words to say reviewing the latest AMG estate, when you only did the coupe version last month. And in the older publications how many times do I need someone to recant yet another story about Brooklands, or Stirling Moss in the ‘55 Mille Miglia. Not again....yawn, yawn...the whole thing needs fresh ideas, new writing styles, more and expansive stuff on what readers actually want, not simply stuff that falls into their lap due to a cosy relationship with Porsche or McLaren. There’s more out there than that.
2) which leads onto the journalists themselves. Like some surmise, if in EVO’s case if things did start to go downhill after Metcalfe left it’s probably because it can correlate to the view he knew how to run a business. Your average journo, who I’d put at the lighter end of the ‘creative’ spectrum, I just wouldn’t ask them to do much more than write an article, let alone run a magazine, or pitch to an exec a great idea for yet another periodical that caters to xy&z sectors. When I see things like Vantage or Enzo magazine launched, with the same old crew from the likes of Octane and EVO, I think it’s the most cynical and dull exercise. Padding out another mag with old thoughts yanked out from another magazine’s back catalogue, it’s hardly visionary is it?
Teenagers with iPhones have been disrupting the journos world with shonky YouTube videos for the last couple of years. But instead of twitteringincessantly at how ‘unfair’ it is that some kid has instant access to a Lamborghini car launch, yet they’re waiting for an invite, why don’t they get ahead of understanding changing customer appetites, demographics, technology trends. All I see in response is more a reversion to sticking on the flat cap, and heading down to Goodwood for another jolly with the rest of them, and hoping the subsequent article written about it will hold anyone’s interest.
I personally don’t mind if the likes of EVO fold. If it’s a bad business and doesn’t have the people with the vision to tackle things, move with the times, and just pump out more of the same (or less in the case of ECOTY
), then it’s all Darwin. Let it fold. Car & Driver still sell 1.3m copies each month and the likes of Motor Trend and Roadkill have taken on the YouTubers and pumped out quality stock. Like in any industry, those who know what they are doing will survive and those who don’t, won’t. It's dreadful now.
Read an article by Henry Catchpole recently in Audi mag and I'd forgotten how good his road trip articles were. They really have no writing talent in their main roster now (notwithstanding the occasional input from Meaden and Sutcliffe). You can see how desperate they've got as they've had to resort to using one of their designers (Will Beaumont) as a writer for content.
I was never a fan of Nick Trott, but looking back, he was actually doing a pretty good job.
Have a look at an old Fast Fleet article and you'll see how bad that has got too. Used to be my favourite part of the magazine, now I'm lucky if I'm interested in half the cars there.
Read an article by Henry Catchpole recently in Audi mag and I'd forgotten how good his road trip articles were. They really have no writing talent in their main roster now (notwithstanding the occasional input from Meaden and Sutcliffe). You can see how desperate they've got as they've had to resort to using one of their designers (Will Beaumont) as a writer for content.
I was never a fan of Nick Trott, but looking back, he was actually doing a pretty good job.
Have a look at an old Fast Fleet article and you'll see how bad that has got too. Used to be my favourite part of the magazine, now I'm lucky if I'm interested in half the cars there.
monthefish said:
I was never a fan of Nick Trott, but looking back, he was actually doing a pretty good job.
I couldn't disagree more. That's where the rot started, and just before he left I'd cancelled a 19 year subscription. Classic example of a company man promoted into a spot because his face fits. Notice the number of watch features and adverts shortly after his arrival.Didn't have the passion of Metcalfe, the writing ability of Meaden, or the driving ability of Harris.
RIP evo
monthefish said:
...Fast Fleet article...
What they should be doing is getting more long term reviews from readers with interesting cars, such as when Harry Metcalfe was a farmer writing about his Maserati in old Performance Car, or David Yu with his mega-horsepower (for the day) Skyline, or Simon George and his intergalactic mileage Lambos (although I have just flicked through the latest issue (for the first time, it arrived over the weekend!) and see that his has contributed to Fast Fleet this month).As it is the PH 'Reader's Cars' forum is a better resource.
Ha ha, no I'm not his mouthpiece. That's not the way it works in our house, although I can't speak for yours!
I'm the first person to stand up and criticise the magazine industry (largely why I'm unemployable) but there's been a landslide shift over the last 20 years. I don't know what the answer is but I do know that 12 year old boys don't hang posters of exotic cars on their walls, file away the nerd-like stats and dream, one day, of owning them. Engage the kids and you'll engage the next generation of enthusiasts and therefore sell the dream. The kids, these days, dream of computer games and becoming You Tube stars. They don't actually want to live it in real life. Probably because they don't know how to live it in real life. I feel a bit sorry for them.
Magazines have always gone through a cycle because they've 'seen' a moment and grasped it - whether by luck of judgement. Perhaps I'll start a magazine called 'How to become a You Tube star'. If I had the £ to back it, I'd sooner put my money there than on a car magazine!
I'm the first person to stand up and criticise the magazine industry (largely why I'm unemployable) but there's been a landslide shift over the last 20 years. I don't know what the answer is but I do know that 12 year old boys don't hang posters of exotic cars on their walls, file away the nerd-like stats and dream, one day, of owning them. Engage the kids and you'll engage the next generation of enthusiasts and therefore sell the dream. The kids, these days, dream of computer games and becoming You Tube stars. They don't actually want to live it in real life. Probably because they don't know how to live it in real life. I feel a bit sorry for them.
Magazines have always gone through a cycle because they've 'seen' a moment and grasped it - whether by luck of judgement. Perhaps I'll start a magazine called 'How to become a You Tube star'. If I had the £ to back it, I'd sooner put my money there than on a car magazine!
skintemma said:
Ha ha, no I'm not his mouthpiece. That's not the way it works in our house, although I can't speak for yours!
I'm the first person to stand up and criticise the magazine industry (largely why I'm unemployable) but there's been a landslide shift over the last 20 years. I don't know what the answer is but I do know that 12 year old boys don't hang posters of exotic cars on their walls, file away the nerd-like stats and dream, one day, of owning them. Engage the kids and you'll engage the next generation of enthusiasts and therefore sell the dream. The kids, these days, dream of computer games and becoming You Tube stars. They don't actually want to live it in real life. Probably because they don't know how to live it in real life. I feel a bit sorry for them.
Magazines have always gone through a cycle because they've 'seen' a moment and grasped it - whether by luck of judgement. Perhaps I'll start a magazine called 'How to become a You Tube star'. If I had the £ to back it, I'd sooner put my money there than on a car magazine!
Touché! I surrender, the ‘mouthpiece’ bit was innocently put I'm the first person to stand up and criticise the magazine industry (largely why I'm unemployable) but there's been a landslide shift over the last 20 years. I don't know what the answer is but I do know that 12 year old boys don't hang posters of exotic cars on their walls, file away the nerd-like stats and dream, one day, of owning them. Engage the kids and you'll engage the next generation of enthusiasts and therefore sell the dream. The kids, these days, dream of computer games and becoming You Tube stars. They don't actually want to live it in real life. Probably because they don't know how to live it in real life. I feel a bit sorry for them.
Magazines have always gone through a cycle because they've 'seen' a moment and grasped it - whether by luck of judgement. Perhaps I'll start a magazine called 'How to become a You Tube star'. If I had the £ to back it, I'd sooner put my money there than on a car magazine!
My points about the YouTube kids and all the rest of it, aren’t about singing any great praise for what they are doing or how they are doing it. I’m merely using it as an example of how in one industry (car journalism), things are being turned on its head - disrupted - by this recent thirst, mainly by a younger crowd to get their kicks/info/enjoyment from those who merely wield a cameraphone (with varying levels of ability and graft, admittedly) at a passing car. It’s an example. Of course there are multiple other factors but people are more and more drawn to sucking in details on the latest Pagani from the web or YouTube than wait for EVO or Car to do a grand reveal.
But it (disruption) is happening across multiple industries and business sectors. Financial Services companies feel potential threats from tiny startups who think they can reinvent banking. Large computer game companies have to go balls out and bet the farm on major releases because they know their share of the pie is being eaten by a failed MSc who’s just created the latest blockbuster for your phone and it’s free as an app on the Apple Store. Incumbent and aging media companies struggle for relevance when they know they can be outbid easily by a Facebook for top-level sports rights, or a Netflix for that new TV show. There is disruption everywhere.
Where I think a lot of people see issue, and in a fast-moving world, is that something like the print industry is just not [seemingly] doing very much to meet head-on the very real threats it faces. For other industries they see challenges and are trying to do what they can to stay relevant. Sometimes the answer isn’t to meet like for like, but improving your offering is certainly central to survival.
So, like I state, a Car & Driver can shift 1.3m copies. EVO, is something like 40k. Even factoring in some basic math - if you just restrict distribution to their state of origin, you can see that C&D touch 1/250 of their population. EVO is like 1/2000. I flick open Readly and if I go to the US link I can count up 30 or 40 different car publications. Some niche, some crap, but the market is obviously there to support. The concern therefore for the average British car journo isn’t necessarily to worry about why they can’t compete headon with kids watching YouTube videos by someone who’d be kicked off the UCLA filmmaking course but rather how they make their content so good and so relevant that people want to read it. I don’t believe it’s kids and teens cancelling their car magazine subscriptions these days! And that’s the market the magazines definitely can’t lose. In the U.K. segment it seems people are leaving the written word in their droves because the content has become anodyne, dull and undifferentiated.
You can meet disruption, but it starts with making sure your product is quality enough to begin with.
No , they're leaving the written word because too many now have the attention span of an ant. Tldr, poor darlings .
But the thread is interesting in that a significant part of it is not about the message(the mag ) , but the medium - which emphasises how much so many people's reading taste has changed. But the main reason , I'd guess, is that we all change, and whilst we think our beloved magazine has changed , we have changed even more but struggle to accept it .Ultimately. EVO hasn't changed a bit- it's primarily twenty and thirty something blokes bashing out 2000 words of copy about cars .
That interweb has encouraged and enabled our own opinions to carry far greater weight , and to be heard by a far bigger audience too . You would never see the degree of anger and resentment about content pre late nineties , and not only because it was harder to find a platform.
But the thread is interesting in that a significant part of it is not about the message(the mag ) , but the medium - which emphasises how much so many people's reading taste has changed. But the main reason , I'd guess, is that we all change, and whilst we think our beloved magazine has changed , we have changed even more but struggle to accept it .Ultimately. EVO hasn't changed a bit- it's primarily twenty and thirty something blokes bashing out 2000 words of copy about cars .
That interweb has encouraged and enabled our own opinions to carry far greater weight , and to be heard by a far bigger audience too . You would never see the degree of anger and resentment about content pre late nineties , and not only because it was harder to find a platform.
Harris_I said:
monthefish said:
I was never a fan of Nick Trott, but looking back, he was actually doing a pretty good job.
I couldn't disagree more. That's where the rot started, and just before he left I'd cancelled a 19 year subscription. Classic example of a company man promoted into a spot because his face fits. Notice the number of watch features and adverts shortly after his arrival.Didn't have the passion of Metcalfe, the writing ability of Meaden, or the driving ability of Harris.
He had Meaden for writing ability and Harris for driving ability on his staff. (in fact both were good at both to be fair, as were Catchpole and Bovingdon).
It's like a Head Teacher at a school - they don't need to be a good teacher, as running a school is like running a business - completely different skill set.
I don't mind adverts as long as it doesn't replace content - presumably adverts were required to make ends meet.
tigerkoi said:
In the U.K. segment it seems people are leaving the written word in their droves because the content has become anodyne, dull and undifferentiated.
I wonder - I’ve bought car magazines for as long as I could read; I used to buy a lot of them (UK and US, sometimes European) every month without fail. Still have all of them, and I couldn’t have been as interested in cars without reading them.However, I’m down to four subscriptions now (and I’m wondering if that’s too many) - it’s not just the fact that the jobbing-journo editorial is entirely forgettable, but the subject matter too. When the new Audi A-whatever is exactly the same as the old Audi A-whatever, but for a bit of autonomy and tech that will be out of date before it hits the leasing websites, where’s the interest? Obviously, the classic magazines have a much bigger pool to fish from, but I’d find it hard to write with any enthusiasm about the latest iteration of mild hybrid system/fake engine noise synthesiser/smartphone-mirroring-that’s-still-rubbish etc.
Maybe it’s as much that new cars are fast becoming consumer appliances, rented and discarded after 24 payments for the next “upgrade”.
monthefish said:
Harris_I said:
monthefish said:
I was never a fan of Nick Trott, but looking back, he was actually doing a pretty good job.
I couldn't disagree more. That's where the rot started, and just before he left I'd cancelled a 19 year subscription. Classic example of a company man promoted into a spot because his face fits. Notice the number of watch features and adverts shortly after his arrival.Didn't have the passion of Metcalfe, the writing ability of Meaden, or the driving ability of Harris.
He had Meaden for writing ability and Harris for driving ability on his staff. (in fact both were good at both to be fair, as were Catchpole and Bovingdon).
It's like a Head Teacher at a school - they don't need to be a good teacher, as running a school is like running a business - completely different skill set.
I don't mind adverts as long as it doesn't replace content - presumably adverts were required to make ends meet.
It's all about the money.
I've worked in magazine publishing most of my life, and the shift that has followed readers moving from print to online is advertisers.
Google analytics can tell you lots about your readers, and tools like hotjar even more. What they read, how long they spend reading it, where they came from and where they go next.
In the 1990s I was the editor of Personal Computer World magazine. My research was watching people in WHSmiths. We had three columns in the front of the magazine (much like EVO does). Each was two pages. I watched someone on the bus read the first page of what I thought was an excellent column and then flip through.
The next day I went into work and cut all the columns to a single page. On a sample size of one.
So when an sales person calls an advertiser they want detailed, supported demographics. Print is hard, and I've just launched a print magazine.
What's always been hard is January. You spend the whole of December trying to get hold of advertisers who aren't interested because you are talking so far off and they have parties to go to. Then in January, up against the deadline they haven't got budget through yet and want to skip an issue.
Editorial is a squeeze because you've lost two weeks out of the schedule. For most businesses where projects last three or four months, two weeks is something you can cope with, but when you are on a monthly schedule it's tough.
So when I was reading the latest issue, and thought it a bit pedestrian my reaction was "of course, it's January". I'm looking forward to the Evora vs GT3 in the next issue.
That said there are some things I don't think work: the star ratings are too narrow a band. In a mark out of five, nothing gets less than a three. So even with half-stars three there are only five increments to play with and the vast majority of cars are four or four and a half. Indeed I think pretty much every car in this issue gets four and a half. That negates the value of a rating.
I'd really like to see Richard Porter's column moved to facing the inside back cover. That's always a tricky spot to fill, and it was Clarkson's home in Performance Car so The Right Place.
But I love it. I'll buy Top Gear or CAR (the Ferrari 70th issue is great) from time to time, but it's EVO I subscribe to.
Simon
I've worked in magazine publishing most of my life, and the shift that has followed readers moving from print to online is advertisers.
Google analytics can tell you lots about your readers, and tools like hotjar even more. What they read, how long they spend reading it, where they came from and where they go next.
In the 1990s I was the editor of Personal Computer World magazine. My research was watching people in WHSmiths. We had three columns in the front of the magazine (much like EVO does). Each was two pages. I watched someone on the bus read the first page of what I thought was an excellent column and then flip through.
The next day I went into work and cut all the columns to a single page. On a sample size of one.
So when an sales person calls an advertiser they want detailed, supported demographics. Print is hard, and I've just launched a print magazine.
What's always been hard is January. You spend the whole of December trying to get hold of advertisers who aren't interested because you are talking so far off and they have parties to go to. Then in January, up against the deadline they haven't got budget through yet and want to skip an issue.
Editorial is a squeeze because you've lost two weeks out of the schedule. For most businesses where projects last three or four months, two weeks is something you can cope with, but when you are on a monthly schedule it's tough.
So when I was reading the latest issue, and thought it a bit pedestrian my reaction was "of course, it's January". I'm looking forward to the Evora vs GT3 in the next issue.
That said there are some things I don't think work: the star ratings are too narrow a band. In a mark out of five, nothing gets less than a three. So even with half-stars three there are only five increments to play with and the vast majority of cars are four or four and a half. Indeed I think pretty much every car in this issue gets four and a half. That negates the value of a rating.
I'd really like to see Richard Porter's column moved to facing the inside back cover. That's always a tricky spot to fill, and it was Clarkson's home in Performance Car so The Right Place.
But I love it. I'll buy Top Gear or CAR (the Ferrari 70th issue is great) from time to time, but it's EVO I subscribe to.
Simon
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