A local to me print publication (Ann Arbor Observer) showed up in my mailbox yesterday. I usually flip through it quickly before tossing it in the recycle bin, but this time an article caught my eye. The print article offered a little more detail, but it got recycled yesterday.
Observer-Shakeup At Car&Driver
TL/DR: Car&Driver and Road and Track are closing up shop here in town after many years and moving to the coasts. The print article mentioned both of them wanting to put print writers and online writers under the same roof.
Another interesting fact- they are setting their sights on Hagerty. Evidently their mix of print and online content are the new models of publication in the auto industry (that’s from the article, not me).
As I was reading all this, I kept thinking to myself “Well, GRM has already been doing this for years.” And GRM is still the only publication I’m willing to pay for.
That article you linked is from 2009 :)
R&T did just leave Ann Arbor, though. "The coast" in that case is NYC. That's where the R&T website has been based for a while, and now the site and the magazine will have the same editor. It's good news, really. I was at an R&T test a couple of weeks ago that had both online and print article testing being done at the same time, with a certain amount of cross-pollination.
In conversation, I rarely hear about Hagerty as a target but they do mention Evo fairly often. Fun fact, one of R&T's recent editors-in-chief (Larry Webster) now works at Hagerty.
In reply to Keith Tanner :
Larry worked for C&D when I knew him back in the early 2000's.
Other than all of the OEM's had offices here in SE MI, I'm really not sure why they were here in the first place. C&D came from New York to here before I moved here to A2, R&T came here after 2007, when I knew some of the C&D writers. And their office was a strip mall office about a mile from here (where we would visit someone else twice a year).
As much as I knew them, I stopped my subscription to them a long time ago. Given how many people leaving, nobody will even notice.
In reply to Keith Tanner :
That’s funny! I paid no attention to the date on the one I linked. Details, details ;-) I guess The Observer waits to make their articles available online- makes sense.
I tried to hang on to the actual article so I could cite what was written instead of going from memory.
There was a blurb in there about Automobile Magazine being started out of the two as well. I’ll let the folks that know the situation explain it :-)
C&D offices used to be at 2002 Hogback Rd. Ann Arbor.
It's easy to remember an address named after a great BMW.
I had a customer near and I always toured through the C&D parking lot. It was very common to see "not yet released" cars in the parking lot.
Larry worked at Car and Driver for a long time. He moved to R&T a few years back and masterminded a reboot that brought in a lot of their current good writers. Sounds like there’s another reboot of medium size coming.
Automobile was started by David E Davis in about 1985 with the promise of “no boring cars”. First issue had an MR2 vs 308 test, I believe. Given DED’s position in the industry, he was able to pull some good talent out of the other mags.
You'd be surprised at how small the staff is on some of these. Automobile doesn’t even have separate offices, they’re in a big room with all sorts of other car mags under the same parent.
R&T is also now using some of C+D’s resources. For example, they don’t both do instrumented tests of the same car but share the data.
Jack Baruth (Formerly of TheTruthAboutCars / Road&Track) recently posted an Instagram post implying he was now working for Hagerty as well.
As a Hagerty's member for the past year+, I've been really, really impressed by their magazine. I guess they just rebooted it? I didn't know they did a magazine when I signed up.
6 months or so after I joined it appeared unexpectedly. I expected it to be all auction/pricing news and was planning to flip through and toss it. I ended up reading it cover to cover. Same with every one I've received since. They go long-form in depth on some interesting things all around the world, beautiful photography and relevant coverage of collectibles.
I'm a fan. It's on rotation with GRM & CRM on my Saturday morning readings during breakfast.
Been a Hagerty member for a few years. Have noticed recently their mag has gotten a lot better. Used to just leaf through it and toss it. Now it goes in the stack with GRM & CM to read on weekend mornings during breakfast and in my backpack for plane reading when I travel.
there is much love/hate relationship for many people in Ann Arbor. Quite the dichotomy
