Bicycling Trade Magazine and Phil Latz

[AUbicycles]

Phil Latz is the founder of the Bicycling Australia family of magazines which were purchased by Yaffa and offices moved from Wollongong to Sydney.

Phil continued with the Bicycling Trade magazine which is industry focused - essentially Australian cycling industry relevant news. This has run (again) for the last few years as a print mag.

Latz recently announced that he is stepping away from Bicycling Trade magazine and also the next issue will be the last print version... and it will continue in online format: bicyclingtrade.com.au with Gary Hunt (Bicycling Australia) as the editor.

The next step for Phil Latz, who knows virtually everyone in the industry through the magazines, will continue with his advocacy endeavours and development director of the cycling industry organisation Australian Cycling Promotion Foundation.

[MichaelB]

..the next issue will be the last print version... and it will continue in online format: bicyclingtrade.com.au ....

Seems to be a growing theme.

I find 'thumbing' through an iPad or similar is not the same (tried it with a few online subscriptions).

[AUbicycles]

Agree - with bike magazines if they have replicable content then print finds it hard to compete. Also the internet improved access to international news so you can go to a UK or US site for their local info and news but also easily get multiple views from different online publishers on the same topic.

Bicycling Trade was somewhat unique in that it had trade articles and long-form articles which were generally not otherwise readily available. But it was also a small publication with a small audience and generally not a 'for sale' magazine - rather I understand it was supported by advertising and sent to cycling industry members (wholesalers, retailers, etc).

They did try and differentiate between online and offline content - though when it comes down to the bottom dollar - under the Yaffa umbrella it becomes a side-project which is cheaper and easier to manage in an online format.

An issue with Yaffa is that they started sending out newsletters with irrelevant content - so I was getting news / info about things completely unrelated to cycling. The is a strategy of using a database but not taking care so there are short term wins and long term losses for the outlet.