29.9.22 WORD ON THE STREET
word on the street 1 This is Word on the Street. This ‘magazine-in-a-day’ is a snapshot of the inaugural Magazine Street conference – and the magazine publishing industry we all love to be part of. In its pages you’ll find examples of the passion, knowledge and sheer bloodymindedness that gets publications from concept to treasured product. Editor and writer: Joanna Cummings Creative director: Simon Esterson Photographer: Philip Sayer Printing and distribution: Chris Wills at The Manson Group 29.9.22
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4 word on the street Between the ages of nine and 14, I used to run to the newsagent to see magazines arrive – I would wait for them to be unpacked so that I could get my copy. That just doesn’t happen anymore. People don’t wake up in the morning and think ‘I’m going to WHSmith’s to find an interesting curated magazine experience’. They go to WHSmith’s to get a bottle of water, and then think about buying a magazine. Even then the range isn’t very large, so the concept of browseability has become really hard to comprehend. The idea that the retailer’s going to do the discoverability for you… it’s not going to happen. But there is hope. I think we’re seeing a return to magazines fulfilling different functions in people’s lives. When magazines were at their peak, we were more interested in shifting lots of copies, but with the demise of the newsstand I think magazines need to find a new place in the world. In a sense, they’re going back to the way that people created journals: you published content that you were interested in, then you found communities of people who were also interested in that content, and then you connected the two. I think we’re moving to smaller, more engaged audiences, and finding economic models where you can work with a circulation of several thousand copies, as opposed to thinking about how to sell 40,000. Your direct relationship with your customer has to be interesting. I find it particularly fascinating how the role of the editor has been completely transformed: now they are more like curators of their community. Freelancer magazine My guilty pleasure is… ‘Noble Rot’, the wine magazine. It shouldn’t work at all, but it works brilliantly. Even the name is silly– it’s meaningless to a lot of people, but it refers to the process that takes place when sweet wine is made. It was created by a bunch of people who weren’t snobs, and who wanted to drink nice wine and turn it into a magazine – and now they’ve got two restaurants, a wine-importing business and a thriving community. When you hit the sweet spots like this, you can begin to build communities. HOW ARE MAGAZINES GOING TO EXIST IN THE 21ST CENTURY? BY KERIN O’CONNOR THE MAGIC AND THE GLORY
word on the street 5 uses its newsletter, The Dunker, as a way to build a community and make its brand more important to people’s lives. And that’s the path that’s going to give independent magazines the way to grow their brand – being able to talk directly to their customers. That’s how you begin to harness purpose. The newsstand COVID should have shaken us out of the complacent belief that the newsstand can support us. With the newsstand, you’re relying on so many things to go right. You’re relying on a great relationship with your distributor, on people having prior knowledge of your magazine, on someone finding your magazine in a crowded newsstand… and in the case of independent magazines, the expense. You’re trying to sell a magazine for £10, next to a mag at a few quid. There are so many barriers. It’s heartbreaking to see people go into newsstand, realise it’s much more expensive than they thought, print a load of copies because their distributors told them to and then sell 5% of what they put out. But it’s not because their magazine is ‘bad’ – it’s because that’s not how it works. It hasn’t worked for a long time. I’m not a newsstand snob. I’m trying to say you need a vibrant way of thinking about how your magazine can be distributed, have a detached calmness about how you choose to build your audience, and always be focused on as many connection points as you can have. One of the things I hope will emerge is subscriptions. During the pandemic, people started buying magazines on subscription again, and lots of publishers saw sales going up – particularly genres like homes and interiors, which became a really vibrant category. I also think ecommerce is beginning to be normalised now and I think customers are okay with it. It’s so prevalent in the industry, and I think the independents can start thinking about it in new ways. This can be quite daunting when you’re an independent publisher, but it has to be the future for the independent magazine sector, whether that’s unifying and sharing best practice, or simplifying the process. Subscription models are very technical, and I think that frightens a lot of people. While my heart would definitely move towards print, I think we’re going to have to use digital to collect our communities. It’s a happy way of bringing it all together. The demise of advertising income means we’ve got to concentrate on the customer. If you’re relying on your customer, not on a third party, that’s a really good place to be. That’s how we live going forward– speaking directly to customers. The future I always think, ‘Let’s be positive. Let’s get up in the morning and give it a go. Let’s remind ourselves how great we are and how much good stuff we produce.’ Maybe spend a bit of time on that. I’m not trying to sort of brush anything under the carpet or claim that it’s not difficult at times, but I think it’s a lovely industry. Sometimes we talk ourselves into the doom and gloom, which doesn’t always feel warranted. 25 years ago I remember people saying that books were going to die. Or more recently, that the iPad was going to kill magazines. Neither has happened. I read a really good book recently, about the problems with AI. How you can’t tell the difference between AI and us, and whether we should become more like robots: work harder, be more productive, send more emails. We even use all this tech that makes us more like robots. That’s us trying to compete with computers, and we’re losing. In fact, we’ve already lost. We cannot win that fight. What we can win is the fight of being more human. We can win the fight by actually speaking to someone, or by being yourself. The more human we are, the more likely we are to come up with creative stuff. You don’t need to follow a Californian nine-step productivity programme to become more ‘agile’. Just trust your instincts. I think in publishing, resilience is more important than productivity. Resilience gets you there. Resilience is the ability to pick yourself up when things go wrong, the ability to be open minded and keep going. Productivity will exhaust you; it will not make you more human. With resilience, if you really want to do it, if you believe in it, you will find a way. We have to make a call about what’s important right now. And so… For me, it comes down to purpose. When you have purpose, you can unify around it, and find your community. It gives you a reason to find your readers, it gives you reasons to talk to them, reason to engage. When you understand your purpose and align it to the needs of your customers, then you have the magic. Magazine Street host Kerin has been part of the magazine industry for almost 30 years, running titles such as ‘Maxim’ and ‘Men’s Fitness’ and launching ‘The Week Junior’ in 2015. He is now CEO of Atlas, a subscriptions consultancy.
6 word on the street With her hyper-local publication, ‘Greater Govanhill’, Rhiannon Davis is doing an incredible job of representing the community she serves – and hopes to restore a little faith in the media while she’s at it. COMMUNITY DRIVE
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8 word on the street The biggest problem in the media at the moment is lack of trust. It’s been broken or lost – or in some cases, maybe it was never there in the first place! I think a lot of work has to be done to rebuild that trust, because without it, we don’t have an audience. We don’t have any money coming in, because advertising and revenue both depend on that audience. We also don’t have stories. I think showing up for your community is a way of building trust. Greater Govanhill magazine is a hyperlocal and community solutions-focused multilingual magazine, that covers a small neighbourhood in Glasgow. It’s one of the most multicultural and diverse, but also one of the most socially deprived neighbourhoods in the city. It has quite a bad reputation, because of racism and xenophobia, and it tends to get scapegoated for a lot of issues that are actually city wide. With the magazine, I wanted not to ignore these issues but to cover them in a solutions-focused way. I wanted it to be community driven, and representative of that community – rather than me, as a journalist, coming in and deciding what I wanted to write. Active listening Initially I visited loads of community organisations and groups, went to events and did an online survey. I listened in a meaningful way. The whole magazine – concept, design, format, our regular features – came from what people were telling me they wanted. Listening to your audience and not making assumptions is one way of showing up. But it requires more than that. It’s a continuous process; it’s about finding ways to keep bringing people in. We’ve been able to build what we have because people trust and believe in the magazine. There’s no paywall on the magazine, and it’s free for everyone. I invite people to editorial meetings before each issue. Once the topic is decided, I call for pitches, and then I discuss those pitches with members, volunteers and contributors. Generally, there’s a democratic process but when it comes to making the final decisions, as editor-in-chief I tend to take that lead. I consider myself a Neverland ruler, however, as opposed to an authoritarian one! I spend a lot of time doing things that don’t necessarily benefit the magazine directly. For me, that means going along to community meetings, taking part in consultations, sharing other people’s information, being part of networks, having stalls at events… These might not produce stories, but it’s a way of being there and being visible. Being accessible and transparent. Of course, I recognise that I have an advantage in this respect – these days, a lot of magazines and digital publications are online and don’t have that geographical proximity. But I think there are ways you can replicate community engagement online. And speaking of advantage… I’m conscious of my own privilege here: I’m not originally from Govanhill, I’m white, I’m middle class. But that’s where it comes back to listening carefully. It’s about centring other people, making space for them and then holding that space. Occasionally I might have to fill a gap in the magazine if some content hasn’t come through, but most articles aren’t by me. It’s also about purposeful engagement; I recognise that if I genuinely want to serve the community, if this is to be public interest journalism, then I have to be careful I am not just engaging the people who are most likely to engage. People talk about ‘hard to reach’ audiences all the time, but I don’t think it’s that they are hard to reach – you’re just not trying hard enough. It means going to organisations that already exist, that are already engaging people who might otherwise be underrepresented in the media or disadvantaged. It’s about speaking to people where they are and on their terms, not expecting them to come to me. It’s about supporting them and empowering them to write. The language issue Each issue we have about seven or eight articles in different community languages – that was a big part of the magazine from the start. There are apparently 88 different languages spoken on the ‘It’s about centring other people, making space for them and then holding that space’
word on the street 9 streets of Govanhill, which is really special, certainly in such a small neighbourhood. So much is done to force people to learn English, but it’s also about recognising and celebrating the diversity that exists within the community. That helps to normalise differences. Even the people who don’t necessarily speak the languages respond really well to seeing other languages side by side. And it’s not only about representing community languages, it’s about integration. We have little language quizzes, or sometimes translation guides for a few of the key words. It’s a way to help members of this community learn a few words of a different language. In fact, the theme of the next issue is ‘integration’, and we’re going to have a pull-out guide with multilingual ‘small talk’ phrases so people can talk to their neighbours. Being able to greet each other in the right language is a really powerful thing. Harnessing networks We have some big plans for our future. Firstly, we are about to take on our own premises. It’s going to be on the high street, and again, we want it to be an accessible community space that people will pop into, and come for training and workshops. I’m also developing ideas around collaborating with other publications in Scotland, and trying to find ways to support and collaborate, to share resources, time and skills. I get so much out of connecting with other publishers, that I’d like to harness that. We’re also looking at how we can replicate our current model and learn lessons from launching this first publication to see if we can do even better next time. I’d love to uplift the sector as a whole. Our last issue was produced entirely by young people from underrepresented backgrounds: young women, Pakistani Scottish people, people with disabilities, people from the LGBT community, people from the Roma community. They wrote all the features for the magazine – and now they all want to work in journalism. Some of them are even doing training and taking qualifications. It’s so rewarding to see it bloom. Slowly, let’s make a difference.
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word on the street 11 This summer I’ve been working on ‘Fest’ the Edinburgh festival magazine. It’s been the best experience! We printed four issues over July and August, and I was really proud of them. I know what it’s like to land your dream job. Less than two years after my Masters in Publishing, I was working as Editor of The List. My role was made redundant during the pandemic. I felt that if this could happen to me, when I work so hard, then what’s the point of sticking around in an industry that doesn’t want me anymore? But I have fallen back in love with it. In the last couple of years I’ve felt quite angry at the creative industries. So many of my friends lost their jobs left, right and centre. All this amazing talent. It felt like a real shame that they weren’t being protected. I think there should be more solidarity. I feel really strongly that staff retention is important. If you bring somebody into a company, make sure you have plans to help them grow. Sometimes I have felt like I’m ticking a box. I think a lot of people of colour have felt this way. People are coming into the industry with really good intentions to change things, but then they’re essentially kicked out. So the cycle keeps going. Being the ‘diversity representative’ is mentally taxing. It’s essentially putting all the onus on underrepresented people to make themselves more represented. But the way I see it, as one of the very few, I need to do something, otherwise nothing will change. I do think it’s getting better though! People are no longer just talking about diversity in the industry, but are actually wanting to do something. We just need to keep going. I definitely have a ‘portfolio career’. I’ve done all sorts of roles in publishing, radio, TV and podcasting. Last year I published my first book, Flip the Script, about women and hip-hop. Being able to do so many different things with the skills you have is the best thing you can do. You just never know what opportunities might come up. My motto is ‘burn it down and start again’. When I started at Fest, they wanted to do a total redesign, and I ran with that mentality. In more general terms, there are so many people wanting to do their own magazines – rather than continuing to pour money into saving things that aren’t working, let’s support them and invigorate the industry! My advice would be: don’t limit yourself to one field. Be open, try working in different areas. You just never know what opportunities might come up. I have gone in so many directions and it has paid off! At 29, Arusa Qureshi has already had an enviable publishing career. Jo had a brief catch-up with her at Magazine Street, to talk about her working life post-redundancy, her commitment to diversity and her dramatic life motto… FLIPPING THE SCRIPT
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word on the street 13 ONI Building community is at the heart of every magazine. This is especially true of mountain biking title ‘Singletrack’, which, from humble beginnings as an online forum, now boasts over one million visitors a month. Editor and founder Mark Alker discusses the general lessons magazine folk can learn from this specialist title.
14 word on the street TRACK Jo Cummings: Well the first thing I have to ask is: a million people! How did that happen? Mark Alker: Well for a start, the community existed way before we had a print magazine. In the late 90s, I became a freelance journalist, working for several cycling magazines. Most of the magazines I worked for closed within the space of 18 months, leaving me with a dilemma. In 1999, I, a handful of other techie people, and a group of mountain bikers all came together and said, “Why don’t we just create a website and call it a magazine?” So we launched a website called gofarmtb.com – GOFAR standing for Get Out For A Ride – and we created longform content. We published once a month, all at once, like it was an actual physical magazine. This was bizarre in the extreme back then! We decided to add a piece of forum software to the website, and people would read the content, and since nothing was going to happen on the website for another 30 days, they’d talk about it in the forum. Within a year, we had about 6,000 people a month contributing to the forum. When did you move to print? When the dotcom bubble burst in 2000, I realised that the only way we were going to make any money from creating this content was if we printed it. And so I joined forces with an editor I knew – my current business partner. We went to the community and said, “We want to print this as a quarterly magazine, and we’ll charge £12 subscription for it. But if you pay upfront now, before we even start, we’ll tag on an extra issue for you.” Almost 500 people gave us £12 a pop, and that’s what got us started. We created a print magazine, revamped the website, changed the url to singletrackworld. com. And on day one, we inherited the community that had been there from the very beginning. It’s fair to say that the ‘power of community’ is working well for you as a publisher… Absolutely. The community has stepped up to not just support itself but also support the people who’ve needed it, for example, when one of the members is in trouble. There have been several times that we’ve stepped in to help members of the community above and beyond what we would normally do. And the community has stepped up to help us, certainly in the last few years. When you’ve got a community you trust, and who trusts you, it allows you to be really honest. We recently put out an appeal, saying that the price of producing print magazines is going through the roof and we’re trying to get ahead of it. I said, “We’re not in trouble now. But we see trouble down the line.” The support that we’re getting from the community is inspiring. How did your community come into play during COVID? We had exactly the same symptoms as the rest of the publishing world: as soon as lockdown started, advertising contracts disappeared. But of course, advertising revenue is always volatile, whereas reader revenue is steady and predictable. So we put out an appeal saying, “We’ve just been kicked in the balls and our advertising contracts have gone out the window.” And we gained about a 20-25% uptick in membership. As things have opened up, we’ve suffered a decline; however, we are higher than when we started. We’ve got a new baseline. It’s a community in the truest sense of the word, isn’t it? There’s a lot of chat around the importance for magazines in building communities, but you’re talking about a genuine multi-way support system. Yes, and the magic ingredient is being in it. The editorial team is absolutely key to building that loyalty and community. And you can’t fake it. If the community doesn’t trust the people who are hosting, then it won’t work. It’s got to be a two way street, and that’s one of the hardest things to do. You need to be as passionate about the subject matter as they are. I’m a mad keen mountain biker, so when discussions kick off in the forum, I join in. That in itself breaks down those barriers between editorial teams and readers – and you have to break that barrier if you want to be able to create a forum. Do in-person events play a role in that? In the early days, events were how we reached people. It was great for community building, because of course there’s a direct connection between us and the readership, which is absolutely critical. Looking back it’s probably the best thing we did. Plus we’d actually made some cash, so it was well worth it. Over the years, that started to change. The numbers didn’t stack up. Yeah, we get that contact, but we’ve now got a million people coming every month to our website. ‘When you’ve got a community you trust, and who trusts you, it allows you to be really honest’
word on the street 15 need to give them that nudge. But on the other side, you’ve got a whole bunch of people who are ready to tip off and cancel. You have to work on both of those sides. Membership acquisition and retention is really subtle. It’s about perception of value: you’ve got to make people think that membership is valuable because they get a magazine six times a year but also benefit from the community, feel part of something. And you’re managing to convince your members? Yes! I’m really proud of our churn rate – out of 6,500 paying members, there are only 280 that have actually pressed the cancel button. This tells me that we are providing that value. What about you and the wider magazine community? Do you feel part of that? Definitely. I remember you giving a presentation about subscriptions at an International Magazine Centre event. Your point of view was as the editor of a craft magazine, which seems a million miles away from a mountain biking magazine. Yet what you detailed was exactly the same issues that we had. It was an eyeopening moment: I realised we’re not on our own. It can be easy as a magazine editor to think of yourself as part of the industry on your topic, like craft or science, rather than seeing yourself as part of the publishing industry or magazine community. Yes – as an independent publisher, you see it as a unique business, that nobody really gets unless they’re ‘in it’. You fall into the trap of thinking all your problems are unique to you, and that’s a very lonely place to be. But when you’re in that community, you realise you’re not alone, that craft magazines have exactly the same issues as mountain bike magazines. And it feels like such a weight is lifted. So the same thing that attracts all members to our forum is exactly the same thing that attracts publishers to events like Magazine Street. That shows the power of community. What made you switch from the word ‘subscription’ to ‘membership’? First, subscription has an association with a payment, whereas membership is something you belong to. Subscription is associated with a magazine that drops on your doormat every month, whereas with membership, the community is there every single day. Also, for many people in the community the magazine is actually not that important. It’s important to a great number of our members, and quite a lot of our members just subscribe because of the magazine. But if we stopped printing the magazine tomorrow, a huge proportion of our membership would stick with us, because they get more out of it. What we’re trying to do for the members is a product, a bundle. We’re trying to cram as many things into the membership as possible so that the printed magazine, although it’s critical to our brand, is just one reason to join. And counter to that, when people are hovering over the ‘cancel’ button, we want to give a whole list of reasons for them to pull that finger back. It’s about retention as well as about acquisition. In fact, retention is more important. It’s good to hear you say that. For some, acquisition is the focus and the existing communities don’t always get the same love. Apart from anything else, if you concentrate on acquisitions, you don’t make any money. You may acquire a hell of a lot, but as soon as those people find out it’s going up to £39 for the next year, they’ll be out. It’s like the Penny Falls. You’ve got coins against the edge, ready to fall over, and you just
16 word on the street At the coal face/in between protest marches What’s your flavour of activism? Resistance Persistence Complete the phrase Mother —— Hood Nature ‘Solomiya’ is a visceral printed response to Russia’s war against Ukraine Creatively engaged but intelligently lo-fi, ‘It’s Freezing in LA!’ places environmentalism in the everyday ‘Mother Tongue’ is a boldly designed magazine focusing on the complex, real lives of mothers WHICH MAGAZINE SHOULD YOU READ NEXT? Stuck for your next indie mag purchase? Overwhelmed by the many delights on the newsstand (digital or otherwise)? Never fear – MagCulture’s Jeremy Leslie is here to help. Simple follow this handy flowchart to find your next political, polished or downright peculiar read…
word on the street 17 Where will you be reading your magazine? On a battered leather armchair, listening to Philip Glass How do you like your ‘culture’? Bacterial Visual Which ‘B’ is your jam? Brioche furniture Björk Love good cheese? ‘Cheese’, ‘The magazine about culture’ will make you salivate ‘The Gentlewoman’. Its take on fashion leans towards personal style and celebrating the way women actually look, think and dress Read ‘The Modern House’ for an exploration of new urban ways of contemporary living Wherever the wind blows me What gets you going? Chains, baby Bring on the headf***ks Pick a song It’s the End of the World as We Know It The Great Gig in the Sky ‘MacGuffin’ is a mag about “the life of things”. The current issue? All about ‘the chain’ Like existential analysis, a touch of nihilism and weird Ai? ‘Batshit Times’ is for you ‘Gossamer’. For “people who smoke weed”, its latest issue has a 13mm hole right through the centre of the magazine
18 word on the street FROM MAGS TO RICHES LAURA BARTLETT
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20 word on the street Choose your audience carefully When I started House of Coco, I wanted to travel, and decided to create a magazine for millennials who also loved travel. Eight years later, I’ve gone from someone whose friends had to buy them coffee, to someone who has seen pretty much every corner of the globe. I think I picked the right topic, and that was a combination of good instincts and being in the right place at the right time. You can do it I once worked for a local magazine where the guy just downloaded content off the internet. I thought, “Well, if this douchebag can have a magazine and lie, why can’t I have one and tell the truth?” So he inspired me to take the leap with my first magazine. Resilience is key I took my previous magazine– Urban Coco, about independent fashion designers – on to Dragon’s Den. I wasn’t prepared for Peter Jones saying, “Who do you think you are? It’s never going to work.” I knew I either had to prove them wrong or shut it down. So I proved them wrong: I got my head down, sold loads of advertising space, and launched House of Coco in 16 countries. It sold out worldwide thanks to exposure from the show! What was the alternative? There was never any doubt that I’d try again. Keep perspective With Urban Coco, I ended up bankrupt. But I learned a lot. My cousin died at 14, and that meant that it didn’t matter if we failed, what grades we got, as long as we were happy and alive. That has given me the freedom to try things, because who gives a shit if you fail? It’s all part of the journey. Collaboration is important One of the reasons my first magazine failed was because I didn’t want to share opportunities. I wrote all the content myself, and thought I could design it as well. When I started House of Coco, I decided that mindset wasn’t going to get me very far. So I created Team Coco, a community of freelance contributors at the magazine. Leadership is a learning curve I treat everyone the same, and that means people aren’t afraid to come to me with ideas. I don’t believe in hierarchy. The negative side is the blurred lines between ‘employee’ and ‘friend’, and that’s probably been the thing that I’ve struggled with the most. Commercial first In creative industries, everybody knows how to be creative first, but they sometimes struggle with the actual monetisation. I know how to make money first, and then the creative part comes second. I also think there’s a solution for every problem. Be adaptable When COVID hit, we were 99% travel content. Initially, we did aspirational armchair travel, then we started incorporating career-based content, more interviews, more stories about businesses. But literally as soon as restrictions were lifted, we went back to normal. At the end of the day, we’re a travel magazine, we’re there to inspire. Stay true to your values I don’t think I’d make another magazine. My motive, ultimately, is money. And there are much easier ways of making money than slaving over a quarterly magazine. I don’t have any regrets though. I’ve had an absolutely incredible eight years creating memories with my family. I’m grateful for everything that I’ve had. Also I know that I would never work for anyone again, ever. Freedom is all I care about. Know your worth When I was 19, I did a night shift at a pizza shop in Leeds. Afterwards my dad said, “How much did they pay you?” I said, “£25.” He said, “Well, you’re not going back. You’re worth more than that.” So I have had it instilled in me that I can have what I want, but I also have to work hard. My dad taught me that I’m worthy. After a devastating rejection on Dragon’s Den, and having to declare bankruptcy, Laura Bartlett launched luxury travel magazine ‘House of Coco’. Eight years later, the title is a resounding success, internationally recognised and on the newsstand alongside heavyweights such as ‘Vogue’ and ‘GQ’. Here she shares the lessons she’s learned on her rollercoaster of a journey…
word on the street 21 There are few places in the world that make me want to return time and time again, but Switzerland is one of them. It might be something to do with the fresh mountain air, the views that are so postcard perfect they bring a tear to my eye, or the array of things to do that always calls me back. But visiting for the fifth time really did feel more special than ever before. From St Moritz and Zermatt to Geneva, here’s my luxury guide on making the most of the country in one whistle-stop tour… DAY 1-3: ST MORITZ Where to stay: The Kulm Hotel The first stop on my seven-day adventure across Switzerland took me to the iconic Kulm Hotel in St Moritz. The hotel’s heritage dates back 160 years. Founded by Johannes Badrutt, legend has it that the hotel’s fate was sealed by a group of guests who visited from England. In 1864 Badrutt made a bet with six guests that if they returned in winter, they would also be able to sit down on the terrace in the sunshine. If he was wrong, then he would pay for their travel expenses from London to St Moritz, but it was when he was proved correct that winter tourism was launched. The family ended up spending Christmas at the hotel and did not return to England until Easter. Little did they know that their one decision to holiday there would be the beginning of the story for the Kulm Hotel. It was then that the news of winter holidays in the snow spread like wildfire and why the Winter Olympic Games were held here in 1928 and 1948. With so much history inside the walls of the Kulm Hotel, you only need to step inside their lobby to understand the reason why they have managed to thrive for 160 years. It could also be something to do with the inspiring views that are unlike anywhere else in the world. The lobby alone is enough to write home about, dripping in elegance looking over Lake St Moritz, which attract hordes of people every single year just wanting to get *that* iconic shot. But it’s more than just a pretty hotel with a story, it’s a home away from home where the staff make you feel like a part of the family you never knew you were missing. With 164 rooms and suites, I checked into one of their deluxe rooms, which was more like a suite, boasting panoramic and dramatic views of the mountains and Lake St Moritz. With every amenity you could ask for, from the oversized bathtub with a window overlooking the living room so that while you’re splashing away in the tub you can still enjoy the scenery, to the pillow menu, walk-in wardrobe, grand living room and well-stocked complimentary mini bar. There’s not much else you could possibly need, but the real star of the show is the view. It’s the kind of view that, if it was painted perfectly on a canvas and hung in an art gallery, people would flock from miles afar to view it. I took advantage by sleeping with my balcony doors open so that when I woke up in the morning, I would be able to breathe in the fresh mountain air and now no morning will ever compare. SOLO IN SWITZERLAND Words and Images: LAURA BARTLETT 24 THE MINDFUL ISSUE Kulm Hotel
22 word on the street At a time when children are less inclined to read for pleasure and find it hard to resist the lure of the screen, ‘The Week Junior’ is trying – and succeeding – to get them excited about reading again. Anna Bassi explains how they’re doing it. READING THE ROOM
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24 word on the street Decline by nine In 2019, a report by educational publisher Scholastic identified a concerning issue: by the time children reach the age of nine, they stop wanting to read for pleasure. Why? “At nine, most children can read, and they’ve experienced a joy in learning how to read,” says Anna Bassi, Editorial Director of The Week Junior. “But suddenly, they’re expected to read to learn, and it changes from something pleasurable to an obligation.” This could have a huge impact on several areas of a child’s life, she explains. “Obviously reading is fundamental to children’s future success, but it’s about more than where being able to read takes you in your career,” Anna says. “There are loads of other proven benefits, such as nurturing good mental health and resilience, being able to use your imagination, being able to empathise, reading to relax, as well as having a bigger vocabulary and being able to express yourself.” Did she experience the decline by nine? “I don’t think so – but there is a difference for children who grow up in ‘bookish’ households,” she says. “There was never a shortage of books in my house; my mum was a teacher, and my great auntie worked in a library.” Unsurprisingly, research has shown that children are very much influenced by their parents when it comes to reading, whether they are read to, or whether the adults in their lives are seen to be reading for pleasure. “If your child grows up in a household where reading is part of your routine, you’re more likely to enjoy your reading. If a kid grows up in a house that doesn’t have many books, or where the parents aren’t readers, don’t have time to read or can’t afford books, then the chance of you becoming a reader for pleasure is smaller.” Can magazines for children turn the tide? That’s certainly the hope, she says. “They are learning when they read The Week Junior, but because they enjoy reading it, they don’t realise,” she says. “Quite a lot of schools take TWJ, teachers really like it – and we’ve talked a lot about how we can get into more schools – but part of me doesn’t want it to become ‘something that you do at school’, and stop being ‘something that’s yours’. The personal relationship you have with a magazine is so important.” ‘The Week Junior’ The amount of research and thought that has gone into creating TWJ– from the mix of content, to format, to tone, to visuals – is astounding… and exemplary. Take the design, for example. “When we launched the magazine in 2015, Ash Gibson, creative director, had done a lot of work around design for accessibility: the best typefaces and colours, the best ways to present text in a way that people with dyslexia will find easier to read and follow,” she says. This was in direct contrast to a lot of children’s publications at the time, which were invariably based on a huge entertainment brand, such as Peppa Pig or Thomas the Tank Engine, and where content itself was not the priority. “A lot of kids’ magazines are just very colourful – the brand comes first, then a covermount second, then content a low third,” she says. “In most cases that’s fun and entertaining, but it tends to mean they aren’t always legible, or designed to actually be read.” Anna describes the layouts of TWJ as restrained and quite rigid, partly for reasons of efficiency (“we haven’t got time to reinvent pages every week!”) and partly for simple navigability. “In most kids’ magazines, you open up any given page, and it’s not always obvious where you start or finish,” Anna says. “We are providing our readers with stories, and we want them to read those stories – so they need to know the journey.” It’s also likely that readers who are less able to read or less enthusiastic about reading will be put off by the sight of a page that’s very densely packed with text, she explains. “We use lots of pictures and break the text up, and we also have shapes called ‘splobs’ with fun facts on them – almost like a little biscuit that we put on the page to draw in the reader.” This level of thought extends to the headlines. “We obviously want to provoke curiosity, but we don’t go in for gags or puns or alliteration just for the sake of it,” she says. “As a child of eight, say, you might not get that gag, and you’ve missed the point of what the story is about. So we try to be direct. It’s quite a plain approach to it all, stripping everything back to the basics, and literally designing a magazine that kids want to read.” The content mix The choice of content is absolutely critical; as a current affairs magazine it has to provide an honest reflection of the world, but, says Anna, “if we just enslaved ourselves to the headlines of the week, it would be a really depressing magazine.” It’s also a challenge to make sure the more serious or upsetting stories are presented suitably for children, As a kids’ current affairs magazine, ‘The Week Junior’ doesn’t shy away from the real stories – but presents them in a child-friendly way.
word on the street 25 including reports on Ukraine, COVID and terror attacks. “The week we launched TWJ in the UK was the week of the attacks in Paris,” she says. “We really didn’t want to cover that in our first issue, but we had also said we wouldn’t shy away from difficult stories.” TWJ always tries to offer a glimmer of hope to their young readers, however, so they’re not left feeling anxious, and the team actively seeks out positive news and inspiring role models, as well as including plenty of humour. “There is a strong focus on kids taking control of their own mental health and wellbeing,” she says. “That might mean explaining how to relax if you’re feeling a bit anxious, for example, or how to handle the transition to secondary school, or walking to school by yourself for the first time.” Treading the line between informing and influencing must be tough, I suggest. “We always offer two sides to the story, then let them make their own minds up – we never tell children what they should think,” Anna says. They are also “seriously forensic” about fact checking. “The idea is to encourage readers to think critically, and to encourage empathy, to help them see that the world isn’t necessarily black and white, but full of shades of grey.” Anna takes this responsibility incredibly seriously: “For me, it would be morally wrong to push a political agenda with this magazine. Parents need to trust us to give their children something that’s good quality, accurate, and something that isn’t going to misinform them. Our only ‘agenda’ is to encourage curiosity, get children reading, and let them think for themselves. Plus, entertain them!” One thing TWJ definitely doesn’t do is speak down to its readers – Anna describes the tone as that of a slightly smarter older sister, rather than, say, a teacher talking down to a pupil. “We don’t believe that, because it’s a children’s magazine, it needs to be overly simple for them. Of course we think about the vocabulary we use, and we provide context to stories – you can’t assume the level of prior knowledge – but we’re really straight with them, like we’re having a conversation.” It’s a lot to juggle, I say. “Yes, but we stick to an essential formula,” she says. “What do kids know? What don’t they know? What do they need to know? How do we say it to them? And how do we do it in a way that encourages them to be curious, doesn’t make them feel scared and doesn’t make them feel angry?” Deep impact Both Anna and Kerin O’Connor [see page 4] believe that when they launched a magazine for children, it could have been doomed to failure. “For a start, it was a print magazine at a time when kids were on screens,” Anna says, “plus it was about the news, which everybody said kids weren’t interested in it.” They couldn’t have been more wrong. They created a magazine that defied expectations; in the first lockdown, subscriptions exceeded 100,000 a week – but perhaps even more importantly, TWJ turned a significant number of reluctant readers on to reading. “Having subscriptions plays a huge part in that – it comes through the door, and it literally has your name printed on the back. It’s just for you.” Anna says she’d like to think TWJ has had a positive impact within the magazine industry – but it has certainly had impact on a more individual level. “So many parents and teachers have contacted me to say, ‘My child never really wanted to read anything before, but they absolutely love reading your magazine’,” she says. “We’ve heard stories of children who have always avoided books and groaned if asked to do some reading, but when the magazine comes through the door, they run straight upstairs to the bedroom with it and don’t come out for a couple of hours. That’s really gratifying.” Of course in the last two years in particular, people of all ages have been disengaging from the news, partly because trust in journalism has taken a hit, and partly because it has simply been too depressing for a society that has undergone a collective ‘trauma’. But Anna would love to see TWJ play a part in reengaging younger people at the very least: “I am hoping we can regenerate an interest in current affairs in the next generation, and reignite that interest in a way that’s positive. Maybe we’ll save the news business!” ANNA ON… HOW IT STARTED After university, I worked as an editorial assistant at a company publishing preschool children’s magazines. Now 90% of my career has been in children’s magazines. That first job was such a great foundation for me in creating content for children. Later, I worked on a literacy project called the World Book Day campaign, to get children reading. Everything I’ve done, my skills and values came together for ‘The Week Junior’. HER OWN READING JOURNEY As a child I was a massive bookworm, a dreamer. I just inhaled books. I think one of my biggest regrets now is that I don’t really get to read enough. I read so much for work that I don’t have the energy unless I’m on holiday! THE IMPORTANCE OF GOOD CONTENT In a previous job, I was really disillusioned with children’s magazines because at that time the entire focus was on the covermount. All our energy and resources were poured into creating plastic packaging, blister packs and header cards. That was disheartening, because the reality was that kids tore the toy off the front, chucked the magazine on the floor, and never read it. I never, ever again want to work on a magazine that relies on a piece of plastic on the front to sell it. Thankfully there is still an appetite for something that’s genuinely good and well crafted.
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word on the street 27 1 She Don’t Use Jelly The Flaming Lips “I know a guy who… blows his nose… He don’t use tissues… he uses magazines…” 2 The Model Kraftwerk 3 Centerfold The J. Geils Band “Saw you in a mag, kissing a man Smoking a fag, kissing a man…” 4 12XU Wire 5 Magazine Heart 6 Girl in the Life Magazine Boyz II Men 7 Magazine Pedro the Lion “Wouldn’t you love to be On the cover of a magazine?” 8 (You Will) Set the World on Fire David Bowie 9 A Magazine Called Sunset Wilco Need a soundtrack for making magazines? As part of his plan to rebrand The Magazine Diaries, Peter Houston – publishing consultant and co-host of the Media Voices Podcast – has created a magazine-themed playlist. Get it in your ears! SOUND JUDGEMENT 10 The Cover of ‘Rolling Stone’ Dr Hook 11 Magazines The Automatic “Magazines, tearing pictures of me They just fall out, they just fall out…” 12 The Girl on the Magazine Cover Dick Haymes, Carmen Cavallaro 13 Perfect Skin Lloyd Cole and the Commotions “She’s got cheekbones like geometry and eyes like sin, And she’s sexually enlightened by Cosmopolitan…” 14 Vogue Madonna 15 Penthouse and Pavement Heaven 17 16 Magazin White Denim Got any more songs to suggest? Tweet Peter @Flipping_ Pages, #magdiariesmusic Find the playlist here: https://spoti.fi/3ykd76b
28 word on the street It took a module on magazines and the ‘introduction to a whole new world’ to convince journalism student Chris Opoku to start her own magazine. ‘The Chritical’ launched in January 2022, and the first issue – perhaps aptly named ‘Epiphany’ – was published in May. Here, Chris talks to editor Jo about the importance of and need for a publication the encourages diverse opinions Jo Cummings: What inspired ‘The Chritical’? Chris Opoku: When I was younger, I changed my political stance depending on what media I was consuming. I noticed that whenever I expressed disagreement, people would say, “You’re supposed to be with us, not against us.” But I never thought I was ‘with’ anybody – I’m myself, with my own integrity, morals and values. It was then that I realised there was a lack of magazines with no obvious sociopolitical agenda. So I set up The Chritical as independent. That helps us create a mixture of opinions and understanding. The Chritical is a place to explore nuances and differences, regardless of the label that people want to put on you. You’re a human being, and you should be free to disagree and think differently without being attacked. Nuance? That’s something that seems to be lacking on social media platforms in particular… Regardless of what you think, your background, your age, it is so important to have freedom of speech, and critical thinking. My team is made up of very different people, people who you’d never think could be friends. But they’re having respectful conversations, understanding that it’s okay to disagree, that opinions are not always black and white, that it’s important to have healthy conversations and reach a compromise. How can we work with each other, instead of tearing each other down? When you understand somebody’s perspective, that does not mean you’re agreeing – you are putting yourself in their shoes and respecting them. You have almost 30 people working on the magazine – how did you pull this team together? I’m on a multimedia journalism course, so had a few friends interested in magazines who are now section editors. For the remaining contributors, I created a promotional poster on Instagram and started a forum for contributors to fill in their details. I asked every single one of them for their strongest political opinion to make sure I was getting variety. We try and avoid any bias, and that starts with the writers themselves when they’re pitching. Whether you’re a liberal or a conservative, the most important thing is: are you able to compromise? Are you able to write in a way that doesn’t directly offend or insult a group of people? I think one of the LET’S GET CHRITICAL NEW MAG WATCH
word on the street 29 reasons I got so many people in the first place was because everybody’s doing what they love doing – they don’t feel it’s a chore. How do you manage a team with such a range of opinions? I do an induction session where I run through all the topics that we talk about in the magazine. I read every single article that is posted, from the pitch to the moment it comes to fruition. So far I’ve never had to pull an article. My section editors are also very diverse and they guide the writers. Personally, I have a rule that I don’t debate directly with my team members. In a position of leadership, there has to be some distance. I try to explore why people think a certain way rather than trying to convince them of my way of thinking. Is there any topic you wouldn’t cover? The only thing we wouldn’t really talk about is gun ownership. Frankly I find it weird that people are so obsessed with guns. What about the logistics: funding, sales, distribution? Everything is funded by me. I don’t have any ads or sponsors. I’m doing everything out of my own pocket, just because I really like magazines. We were offered a partnership, but for me it’s really important to keep the integrity of the magazine rather than risk our image being distorted. As for sales and distribution, we sell by preorder. The copies are sent to my house, and I package and send them. I also like to handwrite a card to each person who buys it. The more we grow, the more I’ll need help, but for now it’s sustainable. I think it’s important to make your reader feel they’re just not just a consumer. There should be a relationship there of trust and loyalty. What’s the plan for ‘The Chritical’? I hope that soon we’ll be able to distribute the magazine across the UK, and that we’ll grow bigger as a team. I also want to hold a pop-up event where we can meet the readers and build friendships. It’s good to remind people that others are genuine human beings, even if they’re not in your political party or not from your background. While on furlough in 2022, Joanna Biggers realised she wanted to create something that combined her love of food with her knowledge of publishing. Here she talks about how all the right ingredients combined to create ‘Dulcify Journal’, a food lover’s magazine Jo Cummings: So tell us how it all began! Joanna Biggers: It probably started with my love of food photography, which I’ve done for some time. Then when I was furloughed in lockdown, I did some online patisserie courses and got very involved in the food community. By the time I went back to work, I decided to go for it and make a magazine. I don’t think there’s anything like it in the market, so hopefully it will fill a niche. I’d just hate to look back and kick myself for not trying. What made you choose a print product? As someone working in the book industry, I value a physical product. It’s tactile, and you can present content in a way you can’t online. When I consider how I want someone to feel reading it, I don’t think I’d get that across online. I love having something to escape into, something that you can keep and that’s not going to get lost in an inbox. How do you want someone to feel reading ‘Dulcify Journal’? I see people reading it in the same way that I would go to a cafe and get myself a really lovely piece of cake: I’d sit and blissfully enjoy it in my own time. I see them just escaping, taking a moment to feel really inspired. I hope it will be a source of comfort in tough times. Dulcify means ‘to sweeten’, but it also means ‘to calm and soothe’, and I’d like for them to have moments of that within the pages. I feel comforted already! Who is the magazine aimed at? Dulcify is a bridge between people in the food industry and general lovers of food. Food is a common ground, for so many people. What’s driving the whole project is that sense of building a community, and businesses uplifting each other. How do you think your experience in book publishing has helped you? Before Pearson, where I currently work, I worked for Bright Red Publishing. There were only three of us in the team full time, and I worked on every part of the business. Working closely with both directors gave me an insight I wouldn’t have had in a much bigger company; they taught me how the industry works, how to network, how to achieve with a small budget. Also, having worked for a big publisher I know how difficult it is to shift a lot of books! Share with us something you’ve learned along the way. If you need to get something off the ground, you have to be your own biggest advocate. It can be really hard when that’s not natural to you, if you find it difficult to shout about what you’re doing. But you don’t know what it’s going to be unless you really invest in it. Your own passion really shows in a project. EAT... READ AND BE MERRY
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