Sunday 19 July 2009

Boat Mags

I gave up buying Classic Boat a few months ago. It's boat porn. NTTIAWWT but it doesn't cater for my particular perversion. Shoe fetishists don't buy bondage mags and there is nothing for rowers in Classic Boat.
OK, I'll move on from that analogy now.
I have from today given up Wooden Boat as well. It is really great for people who get their rocks off on yachts and cabin cruisers with acres of varnish, brass, gilded lettering and natural fibres, but small boats in general and rowing boats in particular are almost totally absent.
But there is a demand. Every month, the 'Launchings' section dominated by small boats, and a rowing boat appears on nearly every page. This clearly indicates that Wooden Boat is failing to cater for many of its readers.
This month, no rowboats are featured in the editorial (don't even think about claiming the wheelbarrow boat as a rowing boat - it may have oars but it is a tender to a large, varnished yacht and no more. Ingenious though.)
But hidden away in the launchings section, where the real people live, are Bruce Elfstrom's Raider, Ed Einboden's Penobscot 14 and Jonathan Minott's Adirondack guideboat. This shows that there is a demand for rowing content that Wooden Boat is failing to address.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

I agree about WoodenBoat--I let my subsciption lapse a few years ago after an article about what they called "a modest daysailer." The boat in question was I think a Dark Harbor 17, basically a larger Herreshoff 12 that had to be kept on a mooring. In addition, it was built by a boat builder who made one boat a year. So their "modest daysailer" had a purchase price that included paying a boatbuilder's salary for a year and a boatload (literally!) of fine mahogany, oak, cedar, and bronze, and required the rental of a boatslip. It was a gorgeous boat and no doubt an absolute joy to sail on San Francisco bay. But modest? Not to me.

Gavin Atkin said...

What you need is a magazine...

Chris Partridge said...

This has been suggested. One message read 'some fool of a journalist should start a magazine'.
I wish to state that for the first time in my life I am actually solvent at the moment, and I intend to stay that way.
The web offers possibilities, I think. Not the possibility of making any money, but less of a possibility of losing a ton of it.
Chris