Dear Friends and Readers,
I was as surprised and concerned as you all were when the word about the
Motorsport Marketing Inc. buyout of British Car Magazine started to spread
on the web. After all, I have been a writer and later on the Editorial
Board since Dave Destler started the publication over 100 issues ago. I was
just as surprised when Dave sold the magazine to Gary Anderson, but having
known Gary and Genie for almost 20 years through the SF Bay Area Healey
Club and our Palo Alto British Car Meet, I knew that we were in good hands.
The internet is a wonderful communication tool that has the ability to get
ahead of itself, and since I am on most British car lists, I get to see the
buzz from all over right away. Gary called Monday to say he was sorry that
all of us had to hear the info before we were personally contacted - but
that's the way the web is woven.
As I understand it, even though British Car Magazine was getting creatively
and journalistically better with each issue, a ceiling had been reached and
the magazine had pretty much been built to it's potential. They had
acquired most of the interested subscribers that there were, all of the
advertisers willing to put their money into a hobby builder, and a size
(amount of pages) that this level of participation could commercially
support.
I have edited club pubs, local neighborhood pubs and put in my time as
editor, feature editor and production editor at Convertible Magazine,
Collector Car News and Victory Lane vintage racing magazine. I know how
much production costs and how limiting a tight budget and smaller pool of
enthusiasts can be. Two of these mags went belly up while I was working
there (damn, maybe it's ME!) and the other was bought out and changed while
I was off to organize the California British Car Meets. I came back to find
a bunch of strange staff in the office and my trusty Mac replaced with a PC
and a new production editor to operate it!!!
I talked with Editor Gary at length and what I got from the conversation is
that we are in good hands with the new owners and we will be able to do
more and better work with what we have been doing with our British Cars
plus get the additional information about similar, competitive cars from
other parts of the world. This merger of the minds and editorial policy is
based from the editor's interest in vintage racing, where a primarily
British lineup is augmented with cars from around the world. These are the
cars that competed in the marketplace, on showroom floors and race tracks
around the world.
Just because the new Classic Motorsport will now include cars from other
countries than the UK does not mean that this will become a scattershot,
all marque affair with hot rods, '57 Chevys, and moody dark reflective pix
of late model Ferraris and babes lounging on Porsches.
The new mag is to feature classic Porches, Alfas, Datsun roadsters and
240Zs. Maybe I'll be able to sell them a VW/Morris Minor comparison
article. I personally have owned a number of BMWs, Citroens, Datsun 510s
and a Peugeot along with my MGs, Rileys, and over 50(!) Morris Minors -
these cars are all fun and quite similar (except for the Citroen DS21 - I
think that it was designed on Mars!). American cars will be more like
classic Corvettes, Z28 Cameros and Boss 302 Mustangs, the cars that went
fender to fender (OK, wing to wing!) with our Jags, Cobras and Sunbeam
Tigers on the track.
We enthusiasts have to realize that as the old car hobby condenses into a
smaller group that will then break again into show-ers, racers and backyard
tinkers and then again into smaller groups of rodders, restorers and
modernized cruisers, we are going to have to combine certain aspects of the
hobby to maintain our special interest publications. This one should be
painless.
Please don't winge about the loss, be happy about the fact that we are
still here and are going to be bringing you more and better info on your
favorite Britiron as well as additional info on cars from other parts of
the world.
Thanks for listening - the Official Word is included below.
Cheers,
Rick Feibusch
Venice , CA
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Press Release
Ormond Beach, Florida, January 31, 2003
Motorsport Marketing, Inc., Publishers of Grassroots Motorsports, has
announced their purchase of British Car Magazine on January 30. British Car
will be relaunched this spring as Classic Autosport, with British Car's
Gary Anderson as editor.
Classic Autosport magazine will offer classic car enthusiasts more depth
in its technical coverage and a wider range of classic performance
automobile coverage, British, as well as European, American, and others.
Classic Autosport will be all-color, perfect-bound and will start with at
least 100 pages.
>From his office in Los Altos, California, Gary Anderson, editor and
publisher of British Car Magazine since 1996 said "I'm really looking
forward to editing the new magazine. With the strong technical and
publishing resources of Motorsport Marketing, we'll be able to provide more
detailed information on our favorite British cars while covering the other
marques that were so much a part of the sports car hobby as we knew it in
the fifties, sixties, and seventies."
In making the announcement, Tim Suddard, president of Motorsport Marketing
and publisher of Grassroots Motorsports, said "As classic car enthusiasts
ourselves, we have had a dream for over ten years of adding a classic car
magazine to our activities. With the acquisition of British Car, we have
the core around which to create the kind of magazine we have always wanted
ourselves, in the same way we have built Grassroots Motorsports."
The expanded magazine will give British Car readers more tech features,
emphasizing ways to improve reliability, safety, and performance of classic
cars. In addition, Classic Autosport will be building its own project cars
like those that Grassroots Motorsports is famous for building. Classic car
meet and vintage racing coverage will be expanded. All of this will be
added while the magazine will still maintain the enthusiasm for classic
cars that British Car readers have come to expect.
The first project cars planned for the new publication include an MG Midget
and Porsche 911, while the magazine will also campaign a pair of vintage
racers: Publisher Tim Suddard will continue to run his Triumph TR3 at East
Coast events, while Editor Gary Anderson will campaign an MGA on the West
Coast.
The April/May issue of British Car will be the last one to carry the old
name and logo. British Car readers will see no interruption of service, as
they will be the first to receive this new and expanded publication. The
first issue of Classic Autosport will be mailed in late May and on the
newsstands by 3 June.
For more information on the new magazine, a sneak preview of the new
editorial calendar, and an opportunity to chat with the staff, as well as
to find subscription information, check the Web site,
www.classicautosport.net.
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