Women's Cycling magazine

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Well, I didn't intend to offend folks here. It was my opinion. I do give them props for trying, and maybe, just MAYBE simply because they are appealing to women will be enough to make women jump in and get a subscription, even if the topics are not in-depth enough to keep them really interested for very long. All of us ladies want to be taken seriously, and want something written for our perspective, rather than the guy's.

Smurf: my degree is in Mass Communications - in Magazine Writing, with emphasis on editing. While in college, I wrote for and was on staff of two newspapers in the Tampa Bay area, and later was an editing intern for a national magazine. Post graduation I worked as an editor for the same magazine, then as their overloaded art department discovered I knew Quark and a little Photoshop, they started dumping overloads on me. I found this far more fun than wielding my red pen all day highlighting widows and orphans, and moved to the a major newspaper. After a few years there, I went on to self-employment (I left because post 9/11, the working conditions did a 180 and I suddenly dreaded going to work everyday).

That's when I started working with start-ups. Magazines were my first love - I loved them in college and hence the emphasis in the degree. I assisted in, or was the director for the starting of eight magazines. Four of those did not take my advice, and they are very, very dead now. One had great content, a great following, and we were getting there on the design end (the design was OK, one of those cases where the editorial DID carry the book). But - the sales department did not heed the advice of the editing department when we said the housing bubble would pop and we needed ads that would survive the upcoming downturn. Bubble popped, realtor ads died, and so did the magazine. (they said, you write, let us worry about our stuff... lol)

I still write, not for magazines but rather the less than exciting world of SEO copywriting, because it makes big bucks if you are good at it. The design I do is for big corporations, larger ad campaigns, fancy annual reports and high-end brochures and books like you see in the Rockport publications. Most of the time I am also hired to do the writing and/or editing for those pieces.

A designer's job is to ensure people want to look at the copy. Yes, the content is what keeps people reading, but as you know, a poor design will not draw anyone into looking at the article. And as much as both editorial and design departments hate sales, we need those a$$hats too. It's a tripod, and you need all three legs to be strong. The design in this case is... ok. It is a great photo, but wow for not thinking out of the box, design wise.

Your first issue should be no different than your opening day at a restaurant: it should be your BEST. You can delay a start date, but once the food is on the plate, if it isn't the best of the best you can offer, people will not be impressed. You will lose customers. Your BEST issue ever needs to be the one out the gate, I don't care if it delays production by six months. Prolong the suspense - but that first issue is what people will base the next one on. It's what the salespeople will tote around with them in trying to land more accounts.

In my opinion, this magazine is making too broad a sweep. It's HARD to cover all of those topics, and be a great thing for everyone. You cited a good example with the horse mags. And well.... not everyone is in a bike shop. AFAIK, most people only make time for one kind of riding. The riders in my group are only road people. I'm the ONLY one with two mountain bikes in the stable (and I need to sell those, I don't have time for both kinds of riding). So that's my world, therefore my POV.

A survey might be needed to ensure that is or is not the case. Surveys should have been taken already, before the start of the mag to begin with. I only hope they did that, because as I said: if you try to please everyone, you will please nobody.

At any rate, I may have come across too harsh, but when I see a start-up, I can't help but see things that may or may not work out well for the product. That's been my job for years. I just hope they will do an honest good job, and not put out a magazine just because it's for women and nobody else has filled that hole yet.

In a more positive light, maybe if this gets good enough response, we will see more specialized magazines, ones that have a shot at really covering what the readers want (like you see in the horse mags).