BoxRec

I wish you the best of luck James, as there's definitely room for improvement as far as Boxing Monthly is concerned. A greater focus on the British scene and a more feature-based approach both spring to mind - particularly as with the numerous internet sites and Boxing News offering strong, up-to-date news it's pointless trying to compete on that front when you're a monthly publication.
I would have thought that the two crucial areas for you will be distribution and ad revenue, both of which are potentially tough gigs. Traditionally boxing magazines struggle to attract strong amounts of ad revenue anyway, as they only tend to get advertising from people involved in the trade, unlike something like an F1 magazine, which can tempt lifestyle ads on the grounds of the readership they're reaching. Given you're having to compete against established publications for a piece of an already small pie it's going to be tough.
I would have thought you won't have the budget for a marketing campaign so the only way you're going to achieve visibility is through extensive distribution, but in turn, this could mean a big print run and so might not be cost effective.
Ironically, one of your best bets for reaching potential readers will be through forums like this and ESB - that should at least start the ball rolling, and then subsequent word of mouth will help as well.
Either way it's a brave step that should be applauded. I wish you the best of luck and look forward to getting my hands on a copy.

Yes, you are quite right, we are in an already crowded sector, but this is why we are aiming for something of a crossover market, hopefully tapping into the lads/style magazine sector a little, I think everyone will be a little surprised at the production values, which hopefully will be more along these lines than the traditional sports magazine.

It's going to be tough I'm sure, but nothing worth doing was ever easy eh?

James quck one for you are you going to distribute these via post, as in a subscription I could email a few mates and get some support for this, the amount of times I go into smiths somewhere and theres no boxing mag there of any descrrption does my head in.

just a thought let me know.

jamesmcdonnell wrote:It's going to be tough I'm sure, but nothing worth doing was ever easy eh?

Quite right, and that's good news about the production values. Sounds sensible in terms of positioning as well, as aiming for a bit of a crossover means you've got a chance of attracting new readers, rather than just pinching ones from existing publications.
It's a shame the likes of a Naz aren't around at the moment as it's that sort of star who transcends the sport that can get non-diehards interested enough to pick up a copy if they see him on the cover.
Let me know if you're going to do subscriptions as I already get Boxing News sent out here so know it can be done.

anyone who is interested in subscriptions can email me, and I will collate a list, and pass it on to my editor.

I'm not really involved in that side of things, but I am of course keen to sound people out.

I hope that the launch issue goes down well, because I think the Editor has really put his balls on the line to make it work, and of course because it would be nice to be involved with something which can hopefully popularise our sport.

As I said before, we aren't trying to nick anyone's readership, in particular I would have thought if anything that people would buy our mag in ADDITION to boxing news, as we will not be having anythinig like the exhaustive fight coverage they do, no point trying to compete against something as well established in that area as boxing news is.

MightyWarrior wrote:

PompeyScot wrote:Pretty much agree Bennie. I bought the very first issue of Boxing Monthly and had a nice pile of them for quite a while. However, it then tended to get more 'Americanised' and veered away slightly from the British scene. I think a good magazine concentrating on the British boxing scene would complement Boxing News very nicely.

There's a nice picture of Bennie inside the front cover if I remember

It was a great cover shot of Tyson on issue # 1.

Yeah, Hugman and Crawshaw didn't think the Tyson photo was any good!! But Tony told them to use it or be damned, and within a few days of the mag coming out, Hugman and Crawshaw were claiming they had chosen the photo.

Best of luck with it mate, will be sure to buy a copy of it