Hot Charlie,
The RAF Magazine was an interesting case in point. Titane publishing was the partner, under Jervis's direction. The RAF were supporting its production on a sliding scale, as the revenue from sales and advertising increased, the RAF's fiscal input was to decrease over a 12 month period. At the end of month 10, Titane announced the project a failure, it could not sustain itself financially, and withdrew. Several other publishers were approached, and in the words of one of them, "not with a ten foot pole".
Another Jervis concept was the Eagle Moss 106 part history of the RAF, to be sold weely, you know the sort of thing, collect to put in your binders for a complete encyclopeadic history. This was produced up as far as issue 6, and trialled in the North-East. It is common practice to trial these projects in an area where it is considered they will not do well. Then if the thing is a winner, you spend the money on national TV advertising and all the rest of the ballyhoo. The results of the trial were so bad that the publisher convened a team to see what had happened! The results were it was seen as irrelevant, unpopular and elitist. I found the last particularly interesting.
Since that's two failed magazines, when you add the trainers, the appalling clothing range, the rubbish "yoof" websites, last years Spirit of Adventure cancellation, and this year's two SoA failures, I find it amazing Jervis has a single contractual right remaining.
As to Gobi being a nice chap, I am sure he is. However, he was not handed a crock of s**t as another contributor put it, but along with Turner and several ambitious but ignorant subordinates, he actually built the crock and filled it in these cases.
It is the flagrant waste of vast amounts of money these people are responsible for that I object to. The fact that it is wasted not on one ridiculous project but many means they are incredibly gullible or singularly unfit for any kind of
PR role or project budget responsibility.
Why a review of these actions has not been forthcoming at a higher level I am at a loss to explain.