The editor and managing director of Sport celebrated the title’s 100th issue today by dishing out copies of the free magazine outside London’s Liverpool Street station.
Editor Simon Caney and managing director Greg Miall dressed in Sport’s fetching red uniforms and handed out copies of the anniversary issue, which catalogues ‘100 greatest sporting moments’as voted for by the magazine’s readers.
Sport magazine is handed out every Friday in London, and has an ABC of 313,274.
Sport, which launched in September 2006, picked up launch of the year at the 2007 BSME awards and this year won best sports coverage in the magazine sector at the Sports Industry Awards 200.
At the same ceremony it was highly commended, coming in behind The Guardian, in the overall press category, ahead of The Times, Sunday Times, Sun and Telegraph.
Miall said: ‘To be a year and a bit old and to have the sports industry turn around and say: ‘This magazine is bloody good’ is an amazing achievement.’
Sport has secured major advertisers in 2008 include Adidas, Nike, Lloyds TSB, Sony Playstation, O2 and Ford.
Miall said he was not sure what the future would hold in the face of the economic downturn, but said he believed Sport would hold up.
He said: ‘In September there was a real lull and it was really tough – from a sporting perspective there was bugger all and from an advertising perspective everyone stopped spending. But the year has ended strongly and people are now wanting short term pricing.
‘For advertisers we’re a massively safe bet because our circulation is guaranteed. We’ll turn around to people and guarantee a circulation and audience.
“And from an efficiency point of view, we have very few returns while a typical magazine will have 40 to 50 per cent returns from newsagents.
‘The costs of paper are going up, so people who don’t have an efficient distribution model are going to struggle.”
Sport Magazine is published by independent publishing company Sport Media & Strategy – which was founded in France in 2003.
The French version of Sport was launched in 2004 and is distributed to more than 50 French cities, with a circulation of 500,000.
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