..indeed we can…but after what happened to ‘Aircraft’ (‘Classic Aircraft’) I’m not hopeful. Personally I find it a little disappointing that Key now own just about every decent UK aviation magazine. For the reader this simply means too wide a ‘spread’ of articles/subjects. How can Key expect to be able to generate any ‘brand loyalty’ ? Take the current issues on the shelves; the ‘Bear’ feature in Aviation News – which looked very good – could so easily have appeared in Combat Aircraft or AFM or even AI. I won’t buy AN for one article, equally I probably won’t buy either of the other three mags since the ‘Bear’ article doesn’t feature there – bit of a ‘lose lose’ situation for the publisher as far my monthly tenner to spend on mags goes- my purchases are ‘casual’ at the best of times. I did however buy FP for Ian Black’s RAF F-4 feature, where arguably it wouldn’t ordinarily feature! But that’s probably because BaW looks much like FP nowadays too as someone already mentioned! Two positive points though ; good to see Ben D back – loved Aircraft and Classic Aircraft – and Tim in charge at Aeroplane Icons – the F-4 title looks very good indeed, presumably based on his excellent Classic title. More power to his elbow. Unfortunately AMW also have an F-4 special on the shelves currently, which I shall probably not bother with.
There’s a lot of flag-waving on previous pages here about the quality of the UK aviation mag scene. For quality though I don’t think we beat ‘Avions’, ‘Le Fana de l’Aviation’, ‘Aerojournal’ & ‘Airfan’, four quality, independent (from each other), bi-monthly (for the most part) mags from France…not to mention the German ‘Jet & Prop’ which covers classic & modern in full colour, and -shock, horror – features rather more interesting and ‘off-the-wall’ subjects than the occasionally somewhat parochial (ie RAF/USAF) UK mags.
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