• You need to be a registered member of Barbel Fishing World to post on these forums. Some of the forums are hidden from non-members. Please refer to the instructions on the ‘Register’ page for details of how to join the new incarnation of BFW...

coarse angling today

P

Paul White

Senior Member
Sorry to see demise of cat.used to be some good writers and features for all species especiallybarbel.and it only increased45p over 14 years.i'm surprised there's isn't a market for a multi species specimen magazine.
 
Disappointing to see it end. Is there another 'specimen' alternative magazine?
 
It was a great read but definitely declined in quality after the editor change a few years back. Sad to hear it's winding up though as there's currently no alternative.
 
I had a subscription but by the end I was only really flicking through it. Too many uninteresting instructional features full of irritating product placements.

They blamed the demise on lots of things; ultimately that there was no longer a market for printed non-specialist magazine. I think there may still be a market for a general specimen hunters magazine, but it would need to be much more interesting than CAT.
 
I cancelled my subscription a few years back when the format completely changed, in that it suddenly decided to follow the failed route of Coarse Fisherman and went all product placement in the extreme. I recall a double page advertisement of Fox products with an added CAT comment praising each item in the extreme – WTF!

I exchanged several e-mails with the then editor expressing my disdain at the new format and in the end they admitted that the old independent format was no longer viable and that they effectively had to bow to tackle companies and sponsored anglers who wrote the articles!

Unfortunately the future is now visiting the likes of Korum and Drennan’s website to read features and watch videos on how to catch fish with their products and theirs alone!

It’s not just the angling press either, you’ve only got to look at other sport/hobby/interest publications and they are all now biased to the extreme, for fear upsetting those that provide adverting revenue. Take Birdwatch and Bird Watching magazine for instance, they never do a side by side comparison of Zeiss, Leica and Swarovski Binoculars and Telescopes, and state which is best, because between those three companies they probably provide 75%+ of the advertising revenue for the magazine.
 
CAT was a favourite mag for me for some years after it's launch back in 2001 ..l think?..plenty of barbel articles written by some good anglers.
I stopped buying it some time ago because it was obvious most of the regular contributors had begun to run out of things to say. It was a feeling of dejavu when the same photos from previous articles started reappearing in current issues. I know the CAT team were always trying to encourage readers to contribute , and on occasion , it worked.
Shame to hear of its demise, but I guess I voted with my feet 5 or 6 years ago.
 
As far as I know current issue still In smiths apparently they have shut up shop not suprised as stated to many tackle adds.
 
Tony miles.....how many times can he keep telling the same old stories, Stewart moss bless his socks, how many drennan landing net pole widgets can he send out......ran its course, they even had Pete reading and Steve pope on it, absolute know disrespect but if that's how a magazine is going to survive.......well
 
Well I always enjoyed it and yes it maybe could have been done better, but it was a Country mile better than any other mag on the market today. Sadly I will miss picking up this mag every last friday of the month.
 
Hi men,

Articles with anglers covered in sponcerd clothing , pics in articles relating to their sponcership deal , and the following page an official advert from the company . Good story's , but I felt they were insulting our intelligence in the end .


Hatter
 
I gutted to read this. I only picked my first copy about 4 months ago and after years and years of reading numerous carp fishing mags and really enjoyed it. Will have to try and get hold of some old issues.
 
Ben Jennings said:
I gutted to read this. I only picked my first copy about 4 months ago and after years and years of reading numerous carp fishing mags and really enjoyed it. Will have to try and get hold of some old issues.
Click to expand...

Ben look aomewhere near the back you can buy the last 12months of issues.
 
Ben Jennings said:
I gutted to read this. I only picked my first copy about 4 months ago and after years and years of reading numerous carp fishing mags and really enjoyed it. Will have to try and get hold of some old issues.
Click to expand...

I have stacks of them if you are interested :) As to the demise of the magazine , I think there biggest problem was their distribution , unless you subscribed finding it on the newsagents shelves was very hit and miss . Product placement was / is inevitable , income from sales alone will never keep a publication afloat .
 
There's no bigger turn off i'm afraid than some consultatant/expert ?? who can't utter a sentence without ramming some piece of tat down your throat, its all a bit boring and the reason i haven't bought a Mag or weekly for a fair few years now. Its a shame that Mags can't survive without that sort of rubbish but it seems they can't.
 
Hi Guys

I used to purchase this publication regularly but with the usual contributers reiterating the same old information it became too repetative.
However with the seeming demise of so many former good barbel rivers (just take a gander at the river reports) the editors would be hard pushed now to fill it with any recent articles relating to this species and inevitably carp would end up dominated the pages.

Kind Regards
Andy
 
i had a terrible reply to an email i sent when it 1st came on market, it was a sensible question regarding something or other but the attitude of the guy replying was insulting to say the least, i for one am glad the blighter got his comeuppance and am surprised it lasted so long:D
 
Unless a publication sits in a broad and well funded publisher's portfolio, I can't see there being any left within 5 years. Increasingly there is little point or value in them given what's available online. Why burden yourself with publication and distribution costs when you can make content (which can be made richer and more interactive) easily and immediately accessible online. As a business model it's something of a no-brainer.

I think we are in a period of transition though. There are still physical publications to buy and flick through whilst sat on the toilet and online content still seems to be developing but perhaps a little disorganised. But sadly, those that still prefer something in the hands to enjoy, are not around in the numbers required to sustain the current crop of publications.

The other issue we have is that generally, the consumption of news etc. is generally in bite size form and as this evolves further new generations will find it strange and annoying having to read "articles" that are longer than a paragraph. This means that in future, you have to be a fantastically engaging writer with something meaningful/insightful/groundbreaking or amusing to say. That's a rare beast.

It's a shame but it's us, the consumer, putting the oxygen into this evolution. I imagine most of us slightly old school folk will concur in the view that this compelling need for immediacy in every aspect of life robs us of a deeper (spiritual even?) connection.

I have said as much in a recent letter to Kelly Brook. I must confess to being offended by her return of the photos I had sent her which had somehow been inadvertently attached to a copy of a rather threatening solicitors letter.
 
I am gutted its run its course, it wasn't perfect but the best we had. I reached the same conclusions as a lot of you guys and was getting quite critical of some of the content. So I thought I can either whinge about it or pen a couple of articles and do my bit. I only managed a couple as I found it very difficult to produce something fresh and unique, but low and behold they published them. Whether they actually improved the quality of the editions they were in isn't for me to say, but if more people had done something similar we might have been able to reduce the amount of blatant product plugs tolerated in features. Not that I am going to knock anyone for that, it takes effort to write the articles and that effort is how they got their sponsorship deals in the first place and the editors were doing what they needed to, just to keep the magazine afloat. Barbel anglers are among the most secretive we have in our ranks, I'm sure quite a few people reading this could have penned articles that would have enriched the fishing of others and caught them a lot more fish, by why would you want to do that?!!

Jamie.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top