Any Comments?

[ilovecamping]

I remember the first time DH and I saw your magazine.  It was at an RV dealership while we were looking for a new pu.  We saw the name and that is what attracted us to it in the first place.  We just traded for a hybrid but we feel that it is closer to the pu than a tt and we are still pu'ers at heart.  We traded for health reasons and stayed as close to a pu as we could.  We would enjoy reading more on hybrids but would also agree that basic camping information is the best.  I think the dutch oven cooking, stories about get togethers, but nothing fancy.  We too love "camping", not rving.

[YellowXterra]

I always felt PUT was more of a hobbie than a business. I was wrong. I have nothing with Dave trying to make some cash. However I think he could do both keep PUT as is and do the second mag.

[Kelly]

 As much as most do not like being bunched in with RVs, when you go to a show to look at or buy a new Pop Up...it's at an RV show or an RV dealership...like it or not, Pop Ups are classified as an RV. Most PUs have gone way beyond a tent on wheels any more.
 

Maybe so, Marcy but think of all the posts we've read by people who go looking for a PU and get a dealer who either tries to sell them something bigger or a dealer who knows nothing about PUs.

I think the choice of words is unfortunate ... imho 'RV Lifestyle' just does not mesh with the way most of the people at PUT camp.

I like Camping Enthusiast ... I don't like RV in the name.  And FWIW, I will give the new format the old college try.

[ForestCreature]

Maybe so, Marcy but think of all the posts we've read by people who go looking for a PU and get a dealer who either tries to sell them something bigger or a dealer who knows nothing about PUs.
 

Sure we see plenty of those posts, but how many Pop Up only dealers are out there? Around here I can think of only 1 (the dealer we bought from   ), and it's a heavily populated area.

[copcarguy]

I've been lurking around PUT for 5 or 6 years now...  In that time I've made lots of camping friends that I now consider family.  I've even camped with Dave too!!  In that time I've had 2 new PU's and now a new hybrid.  I agree with everyone else - I come here because I like to sleep off the ground under some type of tenting.  I won't even bring up the last time there was a "change" around here - not a good time.  However, I stuck it out and paid my dues, and look - it went back to free!  I subscribe to Trailer Life and love it - it lets me see what's up on the "RV-er" side of things, and I can't wait for my PUT to arrive so I can get my "camping" fill.  I have to say though, when I crack open a new issue of PUT I get that "warm fuzzy camping" feeling that I just don't get from anything else.

Having said that, I think the proposed new name is just not a good fit for what PUT delivers - put some form of the word "camping" in the title.  If I saw Trailer Life, Highways, MotorHome, RV Enthusiast, etc. on the news stand I would probably grab Trailer Life and think RV Enthusiast was a copycat.  However, if I saw RV Camping magazine for example, I would be more tempted to pick it up and try it.  I'm a camper with an RV, not an RV-er that camps.
 
Whatever happens, I wish you guys well - I'll still be here...  

[SpeakEasy]

I have avoided posting on this topic because I'm sure that what I have to say will come across more negatively than I mean it to. I am a former subscriber to PUT, and I think it may help you to hear why I chose not to renew my subscription. I may be the only person in the world who has this perspective, but probably not. If you can address this issue, maybe it will help your magazine.

YellowXterra said (s)he thought PUT was primarily a hobby. That was my impression as well. I am a teacher, and I grade students' writing for a living. I used to grade the writing of children; now I grade the writing of people who want to teach children. When I would read the articles in PUT I felt that the writing was very simplistic. (Sorry; I told you it would come across too negatively). There is such a thing as the grade-level of written material. As I understand it, most of the material written by the popular press is at about an 8th grade reading level. The material in PUT was considerably lower than this, and there were also many grammatical errors. I felt that the people doing the writing were not writers, and I felt that the editor was not doing the job of an editor. It became too distracting to me, so I dropped the subscription.

I feel that if you want to be a serious magazine, you should take a look at the writing and editing. I'm offering this to be helpful rather than to be critical. I hope you take it the way it is intended.

[rccs]

SpeakEasy    what you said in your post may be true, but I never really paid that much attention to the grammer or level of the writing when I have read my issues of Pop Up Times. Maybe it is because I enjoy reading the magazine and never really paid attention to these things, maybe it is because it is written in a way that I can read it and understand what they are saying, what ever it is I  hope they keep on doing it!  I have read articles in other magazines that to me looked like the writer had taken a dictionary and tried to use every big word he could come up with. To me it made the article very hard to understand and I never finished reading the whole article because I got very tired of all the "big words".
Keep up the good work Dave no matter which way you go.

[Gone-Camping]

Speakeasy...
 
I think you missed something at the beginning of this thread about a changing of the guard. This entire thread concerns just that...Dave has handed over the duties of magazine making to Bob Zagami, who will be the new editor of PUT magazine....and with that comes changes. Like you, I no longer subscribe, but I'm considering re-subscribing now that the magazine is going to be changing. I sold my Coleman PU nearly 3 years ago, and have had a Hybrid TT since then, and I'm in the process of converting a Bus into a Diesel Pusher MH...so I can clearly acknowledge that even the most hard core PU'er can evolve.
 
I know Bob Zagami personally and professionally, and can tell you a couple things about this new editor. One is grammer...he's a professional business man, and a very successful one too. He's also very experienced in the lecture circuit within his chosen field of business, and a former editor of another national magazine. I can tell you for a fact that there will be a difference in the way he writes & edit's as compared to the way Dave writes & edit's. Just to drive home this point, we're talking about a person that 'corrects' my spelling errors when I email him!! Trust me on this, if you are looking for a more  intellectual read, then you'll be happy with Bob as an editor.
 
As for the content itself I'll have to wait and see what comes out, I may know Bob but I'm not a fortune teller, I have only the hints provided on this site as to where he's taking the magazine to in it's transformation.
 
BTW, that mention of evolving above... I had exchanged some email with Bob Zagami about 4 or 5 years ago about my old PU and plans on buying a newer one. He tried to point me in the Hybrid direction at that time, which was right after he did a story about Trail Lite in RV-News magazine. I told him then the only thing that would EVER interest me would be another PU camper, that I had no use for anything bigger! I guess he knew me better than I knew myself, I wound up buying a Trailer from that very company he pointed out so many years back. And look at me know, a diesel pusher is about as far from a PU as one can get...but my roots are still under that canvas!!

[doonoak]

I would like to respond with a RESOUNDING HELL NO!!!!  If this new format even gos into the area of discussing megastructures for camping I will not renew... The only reason I subscribe is to see articles on popup modifications and popup culture.  The Reason I got rid of my TRAILER LIFE sub was because the only gave less than 1 %  to popup issues.  So DAve Im sorry to say you lost me.  I cant stand to wade thru the 5th wheel and other crap. sorry
Doonoak(aka)Mick Nader

[Kavoom]

I liked the response that said find a niche.  You might need to expand or die, but how do you define yourself in the "me too" world?  What makes you different?  There are already others out there doing what you intend???...  

You don't want to leave your foundation behind.  I like that emphasis on smaller trailers and light e.g. Chalet's, Aliners.  You could go into small TT's, e.g. Thor's, Cassette, Trailmanor's and look for the odds and ends...  You can move in steps toward the "larger" market without alienating what got you where you are...

If you walk into someone else's territory and leave your core behind you will die anyway...

I do marketing/consulting in a totally different arena and people pay me lots of money, but the lessons are always the same.  

Have sharply defined goals, ask yourself what do you wish to accomplish, set out specific objectives toward your goals and keep one foot back in your strength so you can step back if it doesn't go like you want... Course I ain't seen your books or know your reserves...

But asking us questions casually here without a structured survey to get specific info might tell me something.  Maybe you did that elsewhere?  You are kind of winging it is my initial take...  I hope you don't get a year out and go, well it seemed like a good idea...

[Camping Coxes]

I think the choice of words is unfortunate ... imho 'RV Lifestyle' just does not mesh with the way most of the people at PUT camp.
 
I like Camping Enthusiast ... I don't like RV in the name. And FWIW, I will give the new format the old college try.
 

I have to agree with this.
 
If I were faced with two magazines bearing the titles of Camping Enthusiast and RV Enthusiast, I would be drawn to the Camping Enthusiast because I would automatically assume RV Enthusiast would deal with motorhomes and big RVs only like every other camping magazine out there.