Don't hold you breath, CP. If Treadders get lucky and bankrolls The Mother of All Vintage Aviation Magazines, there'll be nothing left for sharing. Take a tea-flavoured lemonade off him while you can... I'll take one too, Treadders. :ok:

I'm surprised no-one has mentioned the Smithsonian's "Air & Space" magazine, because it wins by a country mile IMHO.

Anytime, Aerohack... be a pleasure to meet you.

Better get on with making my effort less late, or rather not any later... and before my employers demand their pound of flesh for the day... wonder if they'd sponsor a Mother of All Vintage Aircraft Magazine...

Aircraft Magazines
 

IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIts me!

Head down for the last couple of weeks - our annual trade show. Surrounded by lots of semi-naked lovelies for 3 days.

Somebody has to do it.........

I'm a FlyPast fan and buy it regularly from the Shuttleworth shop. A great read.

I've chatted to Ken Ellis (diamond geezer) at length on this subject too.

I understand that the overall readership of this type of magazine is shrinking year on year.

How many youngsters read them? Play Station rules. They would rather fly their (incredibly good and getting even better)simulators than read 2D material.

Like any business, a magazine has to make a profit. It doesn't need to make a profit straight away. My business took 5 years of sleepless nights. The banks weren't interested.

A backer will of course understand that there will be losses for, say, 3 years but there needs to be a huge carrot dangling there in year 4.

My guess is that the basic ingredients for success aren't there. The costs would be huge.

I think we should be grateful for the efforts of those who produce such excellent magazines for us.

My other favourite title? Classic Wings Down Under. Available only via direct subscription. Check out the website and subscribe.

Back to the lovelies - I also employ a load of them!

For the curious. ....What do I do? Check out -

www.Racooninternational.com

HP

Flypast always trumpets the fact that it is "Britain's top selling aviation monthly". Any idea if this is true............what are the circulation figures of Flypast versus Aeroplane?

Blimey HP,

I never realised there was so much interest in hair extensions!!!

Z

Moondance, a few years back i think it was roughly 50000 to 35000 in favour of Flypast, but i think Flypasts circulation has dropped a few thousand.
I no longer take Flypast but Aeroplane Monthly for me just gets better.

I'm surprised to find so many in agreement with my favourite which is of course Aeroplane. My rule of thumb with magazines is that if I fail to read them from cover to cover every month, then I stop buying it. Flypast failed that test many years ago although I cannot quite put my finger on why, but I'm obviously not alone. Not only do I read Aeroplane from cover to cover I often pick out a back number at random to read again. Next favourite is Flight Journal, the American magazine which I believe is comparable to Aeroplane in many ways with a similar mix of articles with an American slant.

I tend to buy both FlyPast and Aeroplane each month, but my personal view is that Aeroplane has become the more innovative of the two over the last three years. The Database section is very impressive, and there's also more depth and substance to their news items. They also seem to realise that Mustangs and Spitfires aren't the be all and end all.... ;)

I've always preferred Aeroplane to Flypast. Not that the latter isn't very good; but if I'm strapped for cash and can only buy one then it has to be the former. Aeroplane has always been rock solid, has a great mix of civil and military and very interesting reading. Flypast hasn't been quite so consistant in character over the years, tends to be slighly more glossy, and is just a bit too warbird reliant.

I tend to buy them both whenever I can though, so I guess that must endorse their product!

IM