[Magazines] MotorSport magazine goes red!

[Andrew Kitson]

Anyone else received the latest edition of 'MotorSport'?
The Goodwood revival preview issue.

Shock horror - the next one (October issue) is to change to a red header rather than the time honoured green! The mock-up on page 15 does not look as 'classic' as the one now, but I suppose over time we will get used to it, but they assure us that the excellent content and quality of photos will remain, infact improve.

Thoughts anyone?

[Truckosaurus]

My main thought is, why?

Is it to get a 'corporate theme' between the Haymarket motorsport titles?

[Pete Fenelon]

Got my copy today, to compensate for losing the green cover (which, as many people have pointed out, has "only" been around since the early 50s!) we are losing Simon Taylor's eye-gummingly tedious monthly apologia for modern F1 - with any luck he can write about something he cares about - Full Throttle in C&SC was much more entertaining.

[MikeM]

Not seen it yet but it should be green for me. Not BRG to Ferrari red, like so many other things?

[Cameron Winton]

Don't care what colour it is as long as they continue with the same excellent content. I have two subscriptions; Motorsport and Autosport. Motorsport is a source of marital discord in our household because I have the tendency to sit down and start reading it and don't stop until every morsel of info between the covers has been absorbed. Nothing gets done otherwise including my current strip & rebuild.
As for Autosport, I am changing the subscription to Motorsport (Motoring!) News. You would be lucky to get me reading A/sport for more than ten minutes and at least Motorsport News reports on what interests me, not what colour of socks Jenson Button is wearing this week

Rant Rant Rant

[Pete Fenelon]

I've completely given up on "paper" Autosport, the website is much better value. My lack of interest in contemporary F1 was pushing me that way anyway; the pay-per-read website pushed me over the edge. They can have 30 quid a year for a decent website (althout it's not a patch on dailysportscar or atlasf1), but nearly 150 for something that just sits there festering half-unread isn't worth it.

[zefarelly]

I agree Cameron, wholeheartedly on both counts.

Is the Motorsport cover colour not indicative of our national racing colour ? who races in red ? reeks of corporate marketing to me

having said that . . .red catches the eye I guess, green may appear to be more traditional and a bit fuddy duddy, maybe Motorsport are trying to attract the Max power market place ?

[Cameron Winton]

As a kid, I can remember getting Motorsport bought for me and eyeing up Autosport on the shelf (bright cover, Carlos Reutemann in Ferrari) and Dad telling me it would be better to stick with Motorsport
Umpteen years later, after doing a bit of psychology in with Marketing on an MBA course, I know know how irrational a human can be in sticking with what first attracts the eye irrespective of the quality of the product. Example: People will buy a shiny red car before anything else.
So, attracting more people to buying Motorsport can't be a bad thing.

[Paul H]

So it's not red to celebrate the 'Seeing Red' event next month?

Sounds like change for the sake of change... :-(

[Adam43]

Yes, I'm going to be a stick in the mud about this too. The red makes it look like the others, or even like Hello! type mags. The green set it apart. As for looking modern? Isn't it a magazine about historic racing

It mentions changes on the inside too, scarey!

[D-Type]

I don't like the break with tradition but I can live with it.

What I'm not so sure about is the idea of road test of a modern car and the comparison with its 'ancestor'. The formula works to an extent but you end up with a poor road test report and a poor article on the oldie.

At least they arent (yet?) going the Octane route of including articles on Gucci shoes and handbags, TAG watches etc.

[Adam43]

Originally posted by D-Type
What I'm not so sure about is the idea of road test of a modern car and the comparison with its 'ancestor'.

It is jsut like the old circuit track 'tests'. It gets part funded because they get a free car to promote.

Old Mini, new Mini.

[kickstart]

I really thought that the "old/current" green frontpage looked just right for the magazine which in the main is read by men over 40 who love old racing cars. The BRG seemed very appropriate.

[alesi95]

Off topic but my collection of Motorsports from 77-82 is one of my proudest possesions.

[Kicking-back]

Ah! The Gilles Villeneuve era. Great stuff!

[racer69]

I'll give you my opinion in 2 months (Motorsport gets here 2 months later, always worth it though)

Will the content change with the colour change?

[Banks]

I agree with Adam - the green set it apart - it stuck out amongst most of the magazines around it - the red cover also looks cheap - the irony is it will be harder to spot on the shelves!
( it also cocks up the appearance of my large collection of green magazines!)

[zefarelly]

having seen it now I'm more concerned with the content chNGE, i SUSPECT Octane has stolen some sales due to its historic race content, although both could do more IMHO, I agree with a previous posting, design icons they may be but a publication called motorsport does not need reviews of Converse plimsoles and deep sea divers watches !

[Dan Rear]

I suspect the change of colour marks a change in overall emphasis. Must admit I've gone off M/S over the past few months, am wondering on whether to keep subscribing or not. Why do they always major on Goodwood for the Sept issue, its getting a bit boring now. Though I'm looking forward to the South article, I'm stuck into some January/Feb/March 1976 A/Sports for now, which are brilliant. Thanks Roger !

[RTH]

If they are worried about the circulation being only 1/5th of what it was in the 1960's rather than deface it they might like to start by getting it on the shelves of TESCO my local branch has 32 check-outs and has not stocked it for 10 years or more - a place most people now buy their papers.

Also a cover price of £4.30 might just have something to do with low sales.

[Vitesse]

Originally posted by RTH
If they are worried about the circulation being only 1/5th of what it was in the 1960's rather than deface it they might like to start by getting it on the shelves of TESCO my local branch has 32 check-outs and has not stocked it for 10 years or more - a place most people now buy their papers.

Also a cover price of £4.30 might just have something to do with low sales.

Like it or not, Motor Sport is classified in the trade as 'specialist'. As such, the likes of Tesco just ain't going to stock it without being given serious sweeteners: Tesco didn't get as big and as profitable as they are by being altruistic to suppliers and unless you're expecting seriously big sales you don't even want to talk to them! A small magazine publisher has just found this out the hard way, having arranged a massive promotion with Tesco: the publisher's own independent audit reckons that there was only 20% compliance with the promotion and the company is now in administration ....

[RTH]

Well that is amazing, I had not realised that, our branch has a very large magazine area at least as big as W H Smiths in the town yet they do seem to stock, what to me at least seem some quite obscure looking titles. I imagine motoring magazines as a group are a significant persentage of the market - they still appear to be popular, some how I expect to see Motor Sport there while I would not expect to see 'Racecar Engineering'

Maybe Motor Sport needs to get itself some publicity in front of new younger people.

[ensign14]

There seems to be something afoot in the publishing world as well. This month's When Saturday Comes had something about WH Smiths putting up the stocking price by a ginormous percentage and as a result Smiths won't stock it in most of the stores.

[Barny]

Originally posted by Dan Rear
I suspect the change of colour marks a change in overall emphasis. Must admit I've gone off M/S over the past few months, am wondering on whether to keep subscribing or not. Why do they always major on Goodwood for the Sept issue, its getting a bit boring now. Though I'm looking forward to the South article, I'm stuck into some January/Feb/March 1976 A/Sports for now, which are brilliant. Thanks Roger !

I too have been thinking of cancelling my subscription as each month the content just doesn't justify the price to me,
nice photographs and Roebuck is always a good read but the track tests are boringly similar. I might just wait and see what the re-hash is like before cancelling it though and I have been reading it since 1973!

[Vitesse]

Tescos and the other supermarkets only moved into news (and later music and books) because they realised that they could use those products to drive up their overall profit margins. Margins in grocery are often wafer-thin or even nil/negative - suppliers pay for the privilege of having their product on Tesco's shelves. These payments are euphemistically called "over-riders" and often give a particular supplier exclusive rights to particular products: Swan cigarette papers rather than Rizla for example.

As the supermarkets got bigger in news, they realised that they could squeeze extra margin out of publishers by essentially "renting out" shelf space. News trade margins are essentially fixed and discounting is almost unheard of, but this was a way of getting bigger profits. In books, aggressive price-cutting has meant that a major wholesaler, dealing exclusively with supermarkets, has gone spectacularly broke this year, leaving debts of £3 million. Book publishers are now finally waking up to the fact that the supermarkets have gained too much power - how long before that pressure gets to magazine publishers?

As for WH Smith, they've just gone through a range review which has seen them cut hundreds of magazines from their "optional stock" and raise fees for those that remain. Small publishers are voting with their feet and withdrawing from WHS ..... they can't afford to buy sales!