BoxRec

josh fg wrote:I like boxing Monthly but I do think that if your going to have 6 pages of quotes then you can't sell it for £3.60 that takes the piss.

I think it'd be good to see a bit more analysis of the fighters styles etc. I like the fact that it is more critical of people taking shit fights than BN.

To sum up, more features cheeper but we like the rankings.

Actually thats rather generous - I came up with nine pages of quotes, together with another four pages of regurgitated "anecdotes" that any idiot could have told you!

Basically the problem seems to be that they are desperately trying to replicate BN when there is no hope of them having the same "man on the spot" feel. Where BM ought to prosper is through the generally higher standard of its writers and their ability to tell a few more stories, rather than to tell us yet again that Haye's legs went a bit funny in round bleedin four!

Tykemania wrote:

josh fg wrote:I like boxing Monthly but I do think that if your going to have 6 pages of quotes then you can't sell it for £3.60 that takes the piss.

I think it'd be good to see a bit more analysis of the fighters styles etc. I like the fact that it is more critical of people taking shit fights than BN.

To sum up, more features cheeper but we like the rankings.

Actually thats rather generous - I came up with nine pages of quotes, together with another four pages of regurgitated "anecdotes" that any idiot could have told you!

Basically the problem seems to be that they are desperately trying to replicate BN when there is no hope of them having the same "man on the spot" feel. Where BM ought to prosper is through the generally higher standard of its writers and their ability to tell a few more stories, rather than to tell us yet again that Haye's legs went a bit funny in round bleedin four!

Yeah, I do know what you mean. One hopes the Benn-McClellan piece you refer to in an earlier post was the retrospective I did on its tenth anniversary in '05.

I like the features and historical pieces too. Best thing I've ever written (boxing-wise) was a retrospective on Duran-Leonard I. Took me fooking ages, mind.

I like the quotes bit as it serves as an amusing digest but completely take on board the points made.

Who is the Boxing Monthly's target market?

IO can't see who it is?

DavidPayne wrote:Who is the Boxing Monthly's target market?

Socialists

Nobody wants 2-6 week old fight reports do they?

Boxing News covers these amply, and the mainstream press are covering the big fights again - a full page dedicated to boxing in the Times on Monday and it was 'only' Alex Arthur.

The internet offers even greater immediacy.

So the Monthly format is plagued with vulnerability on that front.

Do the voices in the magazine demand attention, are they the finest writers and are they offering genuinely original, different or profound copy?

Fluctuating I would say.

So who is the guy buying Boxing Monthly, is it essentially a loyal older audience who buy BN too. I'd say yes. PLus the entirely transient travelling market, airports, train stations etc.

It is hard to see what content could reverse the decline of popularity. It would need a very clear direction to attract a new audience. Younger demographics may appreciate the sports history to a degree but they ar eno longer embracing magazines as part of that history. They haven't grown up with comic/magazine buying habits.

The sale of the EMAP monthly portfolio evidence of the troubled nature of magazines. Several have had still-born launches, it really is a difficult market and boxing is a niche sport served better by BN on a weekly basis.

I can't see an escape for BM.

Ian 'Mr' McNeilly wrote:

Tykemania wrote:

josh fg wrote:I like boxing Monthly but I do think that if your going to have 6 pages of quotes then you can't sell it for £3.60 that takes the piss.

I think it'd be good to see a bit more analysis of the fighters styles etc. I like the fact that it is more critical of people taking shit fights than BN.

To sum up, more features cheeper but we like the rankings.

Actually thats rather generous - I came up with nine pages of quotes, together with another four pages of regurgitated "anecdotes" that any idiot could have told you!

Basically the problem seems to be that they are desperately trying to replicate BN when there is no hope of them having the same "man on the spot" feel. Where BM ought to prosper is through the generally higher standard of its writers and their ability to tell a few more stories, rather than to tell us yet again that Haye's legs went a bit funny in round bleedin four!

Yeah, I do know what you mean. One hopes the Benn-McClellan piece you refer to in an earlier post was the retrospective I did on its tenth anniversary in '05.

I like the features and historical pieces too. Best thing I've ever written (boxing-wise) was a retrospective on Duran-Leonard I. Took me fooking ages, mind.

I like the quotes bit as it serves as an amusing digest but completely take on board the points made.

The Duran-Leonard piece was a cracking one. The quotes one by contrast, was clear filler material stretched to breaking point - a definite case of quantity over quality as some of the included quotes seemed neither entertaining nor informative - just gave the impression of someone scrabbling around for filler material on deadline day.
I think the only way a monthly can survive in this climate is through greater depth and exclusive content, so more analysis and exclusive interviews e.g. rather than carry an out-of-date fight report on Vargas-Mayorga that doesn't shed any new light on it, use the fight result as the background to a piece analysising where Mayorga can go from here - can he create waves at welter etc. Could have a sidebar giving a breakdown of Vargas's career-defining fights - Trinidad, De La Hoya etc - and use that to chart his rise and fall as a fighter. Support it with quotes from industry 'insiders' (trainers, match-makers, ex-fighters) regarding their thoughts on Vargas's career, as well as their thoughts on where Mayorga can go from here.
One of BM's greatest strengths (and USP's, when compared to some online competition) is its access to key figures in the sport and I don't believe it does nearly enough to leverage these. Occasionally it'll do a great preview poll which I always find fascinating, but these are few and far between.

Agreed, Deserter. Some very valid insights there.

DavidPayne wrote:The internet offers even greater immediacy.

Do the voices in the magazine demand attention, are they the finest writers and are they offering genuinely original, different or profound copy?

Fluctuating I would say.

Fluctuating, perhaps. Better than 90% of stuff on the net though.

The fact is that people really have to have their arm twisted to pay for stuff these days. They would rather have 90% shite 10% decent for free than the other way round and pay for it.

I remember you explaining why you wouldn't buy Uppercut. If someone like you wouldn't support a new mag by giving it a chance, then surely the format is, as you say, doomed.

True Ian, I didn't buy Uppercut.

I'd like to buy a boxing magazine that offered genuine opinion pieces, interesting interviews from by-gone fighters and relevant insight into fighters, ranking, sanctioning bodies, proposed fights etc.

When ever I'm in WHS I read Buncey ramble and the main editorial. The rest is usually old and out of date. And I wouldn't pay £3.60 for a magazine.

I begrudge BN £2.55 but it has currency on its side. And some interesting features.

3.60 for a magazine is outrageous. i would be interested to know how much it actually costs to be printed, overheads etc.

also, the ratings are very, very poor. they havent got a clue about asian fighters and are way behind.

the new ratings have eagle kyowa as the number one strawweight but he was beaten last month and the guy who did it is ranked 6th. at least the ring update their rankings on the website.

lowersmiths wrote:3.60 for a magazine is outrageous.

Standard price for a monthly, I'd say.

Ant's right re the deadlines, as I pointed out - it's very difficult and hard for the consumer to understand the gap between having to submit copy and them reading it.

I take the point of the general mags still doing OK numbers but it is difficult to go onwards and upwards when you nail your mast to one niche area.

BM is making money and in the current climate, that can't be bad at all.

I'm staggered BM outsells BN, staggered. Is that cumulative, i.e. 4 issues of BN sales to one issue of BM.

Ant Evans wrote:Some real crap on this thread, boys. Here's some food for thought:

* BM outsells Boxing News 3-1 and it has been that way for years.

* Fighters Only, the main MMA mag, costs £1 more than Boxing Monthly. BM outsells FO, too, by the way although as MMA becomes bigger FOs numbers go up

* BM's main selling point is the quality of the writing, which outstrips any other mag and website out there (and that's not just bias, I hear that everywhere I go, esp in US where the Ring is considered a bit fluffy even before Oscar bought it). There isn't a better team of writers anywhere in boxing, IMHO.

* There was NO chance of getting Hatton report in there due to the fact of the deadline getting moved up due to Xmas.

* BM is making money. Almost all internet sites bar MaxBoxing - are not.

* The stuff Deserter wrote was off-key. My job in the UFC is to get press coverage for our fights and fighters and getting UFC in the likes of Maxim, FHM, Nuts, Zoo and even PowerSlam is huge. The "lads mag" boom of the 1990s is over but some of these mags are still doing 200,000 350,000 readers and getting in these mags shifts tickets and merch, believe me.

Sorry Ant, but you're wide of the mark here on a number of counts:
1) The comment you attributed to me was made by someone else. I've got no issue with your role - quite the opposite in fact as I'm a UFC fan. I'm also perfectly aware of the importance of exposure in the likes of Zoo and Nuts as it's a perfect target market for the UFC brand.
2) I should point out that while I've got no axe to grind (I work in publishing, but the company I work for doesn't have anything to do with either boxing publication), I can tell you categorically that your figures are completely wrong. BN is an ABC'ed (and therefore fully audited) publication - it has a current ABC of 10,689 (average sale based on a 12-month period), which splits along the lines of 9,242 newsstand sales and 1,447 subscription sales.
BM, by contrast, is not ABC'ed (which in itself is a general industry indication that they're not keen on their figures - if they were selling three to one they'd be happy to pay £1,000 to ABC and prove it).
I also have access in my job to wholesale data so I know where BM is 'listed'. It's only real wholesale penetration is through Smiths, it doesn't even make it into important sale points like Tesco and Sainsbury to any degree worth mentioning. This in itself means it can't be selling much, as the aforementioned grocers are hugely important in shifting copies because of their footfall.
Finally, I can see exactly what they're selling through Smiths (on a daily basis to give you an idea of the level of accuracy), and while I don't wish to disclose figures publically as I appreciate there's a degree of commercial sensitivity, I can tell you honestly that they make a mockery of your claim.
3) You're probably right about BM outselling Fighters Only, as FO does dire numbers - somewhere around the 3.5k mark on the newsstand last time I checked.
4) Quality of writing - as I've previously stated, I'm a fan of a lot of the team's content. However, I think they're not necessarily best utilised in terms of publishing strategy. You also have to remember that the key to commercial success is not being liked by boxing 'insiders' (though that has a part), but in having as mass an appeal as possible.
5) Deadline - sorry, but any publisher worth his salt would have delayed the on-sale date of the magazine to be able to include the Hatton report - the lost revenues from keeping the previous issue on sale a few days longer would have been more than offset by the upswing in sales you could expect from doing a post-fight Hatton/Mayweather 'special'. It might be the case that as BM isn't part of a big publishing portfolio it can't negotiate hard with printers for extended deadlines etc, in which case I'll cut some slack, but either way the result is a massively disappointing product on the newsstand at the moment.
6) I'm sure BM is still making money, but not a great deal, and I'd be interested to see revenue/profit projections for the next few years, as I'm positive if the current strategy is maintained you'll see a gradual copy sales decline as loyal readers die off, others switch online, and, most crucially of all, it fails to attract new readers.

re the hatton and deadline issue
i thought it was a brilliant move by Boxing News to include the eight page preview pullout in the issue a full week before the fight.
this was obviously done so that the thousands of brits flying out to watch the fight could read the preview before going to the USA.
that's a publication with its finger on the pulse.

lowersmiths wrote:re the hatton and deadline issue
i thought it was a brilliant move by Boxing News to include the eight page preview pullout in the issue a full week before the fight.
this was obviously done so that the thousands of brits flying out to watch the fight could read the preview before going to the USA.
that's a publication with its finger on the pulse.

Couldn't agree more - imagine if BM had delayed their on-sale date by a week and had a cover flash saying something along the lines of '16 pages of exclusive coverage of the biggest fight in British boxing history', carrying exclusive interviews/quotes with the likes of Hatton, Mayweather, key figures in their camps, observers such as Manny Steward and Junior Witter etc, along with 'Hatton: where does he go from here?', with different writers/experts giving their view and what their own personal recommended 'roadmap' would be...
I do actually think BN should do what they did with Hatton/Mayweather more frequently - too often it has previews on the day of or the day before, so if you don't make the shops in that time frame you're less inclined to purchase. Running a full week before isn't too early, and ensures you're still selling mags a full week after initial publication.

NorthEastBoxingFan wrote:well I'm gonna commit blasphemy now and say that I don't care much for Ring Magazine either.
It's a fortune and always 2 months , not one, behind. I appreciate why of course in that's it's published in the US.

There's no excuse for it. It's not like things have to be SHIPPED in this day and age. Last year, I regularly got Boxing Monthly in Australia on the week of publication. If BM can send their mag to literally the other side of the world in a week, why does The Ring need four times as long to send it half as far?

Ian 'Mr' McNeilly wrote:

E wrote:It has good pictures actually granted...... but that just makes it more slippery when wiping your arse.

Now come on, that's rather harsh.

Magazines are a very tricky market these days what with the net and all. Then again, however good the net gets, I'll always buy hard copy of stuff because I just like them. Maybe I'm old fashioned.

As for Farhood, I've always liked him and his rather off beat style. One of my faves.

Agree with you, Ian. I buy BM every month . BN obviously is more timely and a different format. You get bags more info/results in BN, better analysis in BM. For example, I'm not really fussed about the reports in BN, even though they're more recent, but I always read them in BM.

lowersmiths wrote:re the hatton and deadline issue
i thought it was a brilliant move by Boxing News to include the eight page preview pullout in the issue a full week before the fight.
this was obviously done so that the thousands of brits flying out to watch the fight could read the preview before going to the USA.
that's a publication with its finger on the pulse.

Rather like I have with BM, can you just make it clear that you actually do work for Boxing News? Oh, I've done it for you.

Like the Thai reports by the way and subscribe to BN...God knows how you keep up with all the name changes.

lowersmiths wrote:3.60 for a magazine is outrageous. i would be interested to know how much it actually costs to be printed, overheads etc.

I would say after printing a glossy mag, distributing it worldwide and paying the staff/writers, you'll have very little change - if any - from £3.60 considering there's not a lot of advertising in it.

A couple of very interesting posts from Deserter in this topic.

I only ever buy boxing magazines when I'm travelling on a train. Anything in there other than features I will have already read half a dozen times already!

BM has gone downhill, no offence intended to its contributors but it's a shadow of what is was 5-10 years ago.

oliverfennell wrote:

lowersmiths wrote:3.60 for a magazine is outrageous. i would be interested to know how much it actually costs to be printed, overheads etc.

I would say after printing a glossy mag, distributing it worldwide and paying the staff/writers, you'll have very little change - if any - from £3.60 considering there's not a lot of advertising in it.

Completely depends on your level of sales and your business model Oliver.
In the case of BM, you could argue that £3 was a more attractive price to the consumer, and that the money you'd lose through dropping the cover price would be offset by the fact that you'd subsequently sell far more copies. You're completely right though, that one of BM's weaknesses is that it's in a sector that simply isn't an attractive proposition for advertisers. There are other mags with similar levels of circulation that are far more profitable because their subject matter is attractive to advertisers in that sector, and those advertisers have money to burn e.g. FHM still sells about 3/4 times as many copies as GQ, but GQ attracts far more lucrative advertising.
As for export costs, you'd only export it to those countries where you could make a profit anyway - States being the obvious one in this specific case, and Oz to a lesser degree. You'll also find in some cases that the overseas distributor takes a cut of copies sold rather than charges a lump sum.

Deserter, approximately how much does it cost for a full page advert in the first dozen or so pages of GQ?

Sammy Mendelson wrote:Deserter, approximately how much does it cost for a full page advert in the first dozen or so pages of GQ?

Honest answer is that I don't know, but if their rate card is online that would give you some benchmark. They'll do deals, as all publishers do, for series bookings etc, but I would have thought they'd only take a DPS (double page spread) in the 'graveyard' section at the front of the mag, and I wouldn't be shocked if they were getting in the region of £10k for that type of premium position.

I'm not interested in you disclosing who you work for (unless you want to) but what genre of publication is it?