GM magazine Open coverage

[imanhacker]

Given the nature of our first European win since 1999 and the fantastic finish, I find it incredible that GM give such poor coverage in the September edition to The Open. A front cover without a picture of Padraig (plus wife & son Paddy and a Ladybird or two), one of the most popular winners in years, is just unbelievable.

Is it not for this in-depth pre-major and post-major coverage that we purchase these magazines. Billy Elliott couldn't even get the venue right for the USPGA.

What do others think?

 

[swingstar1]

Is it not for this in-depth pre-major and post-major coverage that we purchase these magazines.

What do others think?

to be honest I buy GM for the equipment section, tips and course reviews.

 

[muttleee]

The Open probably happened too late to make it into the latest edition of the magazine. I'm sure there'll be loads about it in the next one. It's unfortunate to have to wait so long but that's the disadvantage of magazines with their publishing deadlines etc.

 

[MikeH]

Hi imanhacker

Thanks for the post - always good to get feedback on the magazine from readers. Funnily enough I had a very similar email from a reader last week asking almost exactly the same question. I sent him a very long reply but have not had a response back from him. Anyway I'll post below an abridged version of what I sent him as there very good reasons why we weren't able to print as full an Open review as we'd have liked which I'm of course happy to share with you all!

Please do have a read and everyone please do post your thoughts or email me direct michael_harris@ipcmedia.com as reader feedback really helps us develop the magazine.

With regard to your correct observation about Bill getting the venue for the US PGA wrong (and the sub editor's failing to spot it) - mistakes do occur from time to time especially right on deadline - Bill had to have his report written that night and the pages designed, edited and sent to the printers by noon the following day. Our apologies for this.

best

Mike H
(Gm editor)


I would have dearly loved to have given more pages to the Open and Harrington's epic win and would have liked nothing more than to put him on the cover to celebrate the win and acknowledge Padraig's great performance.

However, and here is the big but, we have a very rigid print deadlines to adhere to and the whole of the magazine bar five pages (set specifically aside for the Open report) and my editor's letter (held back just in case we had a European winner or a very noteworthy Championship) had to be sent to the printers before the first ball of the Championship had been struck. Indeed such are the deadlines that the magazine industry have to work to that the cover had to be with the printers for the July 16th, the Monday of Open week.

In Golf Monthly's defence I would say that at least we did cover the Open in our September issue - our two main competitor titles, Golf World and Today's Golfer decided not to hold back any pages and contain not one reference to what happened at Carnoustie.

Had we waited for the Championship to unfold before sending the cover with an image of the winner and an extended report in the magazine the current issue would not be on sale until tomorrow (Tuesday 7th Aug) - two days before the season's final Major, the US PGA Championship commences. At which point even such a great Championship and a long overdue European winner are to some extent, 'yesterday's news'.

I also had to consider the fact that had we decided to make contingency for extended Open coverage and the Championship not been a classic, had say another Todd Hamilton or Ben Curtis type American won, then we would have looked rather daft with a lot of pages and a cover dedicated to 'an Open to forget'.

Another factor we have to take in account when deciding how much and what angle to give to coverage of Tour is the amount of coverage given to the Tour golf in the daily newspapers, on TV, radio and the internet - in particular of events like the Majors and Ryder Cup. I do feel that golf does get very good coverage in our national press and other media there is an element of not wanting to repeat what is out there already. This quandary is further magnified by the deadlines and shelf life of a monthly magazine meaning a preview needs to be written anything up to 8 weeks before a tournament starts and a review read never sooner than 8 days (and up to six weeks) after the tournament has finished.

Golf Monthly has always set it's stall out to cover every aspect of the game from analysis of the various Tours to interviews with the game's leading players and figures, instruction tips, reviews of the latest equipment, suggestion of courses to play at home and abroad and articles on issues affecting club golfers. This desire to cover 'the whole game in one' means we do only have a finite number of pages we can give to tour coverage. We do however acknowledge that element is important to our readers so our magazine coverage is supplemented by weekly previews (including in-depth form guides) at http://golf-monthly.co.uk of every European and PGA Tour event on a Wednesday and reviews of them on a Monday.

This year we constructed special microsites such for the all of the Majors such as http://golf-monthly.co.uk/open2007 which included detailed coverage of the build up to the Open and the four days play at Carnoustie. In addition to the microsite we ran a 22 pages of Open preview material in the August issue (on sale throughout July) and gave away a free 36 page supplementary guide to Carnoustie with that issue outlining just how important the Open is to us.