Clay Shooting Magazine

I have just received a notification from Clay Shooting Magazine, they are no longer to publish the magazine as a stand alone title, after the May 21st edition, it will be merging with Sporting Gun. I have subscribed to Clay Shooting Magazine for years, and, whilst a lot of the content is the usual advertiser promotions, and irrelevant ( to me) directory of shooting grounds, which remain unchanged month to month, there are some articles each month that justify my subscription, namely the (admittedly one-sided) gun tests, (not undertaken by Vic Harker) but lately done very comprehensively by Becky McKenzie), and the various product evaluations, shooting glasses, ear protection, eye dominance aids etc, there have been enough of these articles to retain my ongoing interest in the magazine. However, by now merging with Sporting Gun, which I also subscribe to, will this now not unavoidably dilute the dedicated Clay Shooting content of the combined publication? Sporting Guns’ predominant interest is with game shooting,   which is fine, I enjoy the interaction that the various interests share, but the overall content is undeniably aimed at the game shooter and dog owner, I’m just wondering why the circulation of Clay Shooting Magazine has declined so substantially to cause this merger, has anyone any thoughts that might enlighten me? 

Mags have had there day im afraid to say! News /results are instant on the web now and there's a huge amount of reviews etc from people wanting a audience .

Around my way most of the newsagents have gone.Asda sell mags but won't stock shooting mags so yes they may have had their day.

I have to agree, the emergence of YouTube Channels TSC and TSG, and others, which have become more professionally produced and consequently more watchable, together with the Lloyd Pattinsons’ now excellent test videos on shotguns, clay shooting equipment and clay shooting interests in general, seem accelerate the unstoppable decline of hard copy shooting magazines and their availability to traditional consumers, more importantly, what magazine can I now take to the loo for some quiet private consumption during this essential activity??

pigginspadger said:

I have to agree, the emergence of YouTube Channels TSC and TSG, and others, which have become more professionally produced and consequently more watchable, together with the Lloyd Pattinsons’ now excellent test videos on shotguns, clay shooting equipment and clay shooting interests in general, seem accelerate the unstoppable decline of hard copy shooting magazines and their availability to traditional consumers, more importantly, what magazine can I now take to the loo for some quiet private consumption during this essential activity??

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Download the clay shooter app

I find the decline of magazines really sad. A lot of people's working lives are spent staring at screens. Why would they want to spend their leisure time doing the same?

Having started to take my clays seriously again I recently resubscribed and now after two issues I'm told it's folding. 

After a group of us were defrauded by a certain Sporting Gun writer I have no intention of buying said publication and will be expecting a refund.

It's also rumoured that Sporting Rifle is also going under.

PM.

perazman said:

I find the decline of magazines really sad. A lot of people's working lives are spent staring at screens. Why would they want to spend their leisure time doing the same?

Having started to take my clays seriously again I recently resubscribed and now after two issues I'm told it's folding. 

After a group of us were defrauded by a certain Sporting Gun writer I have no intention of buying said publication and will be expecting a refund.

It's also rumoured that Sporting Rifle is also going under.

PM.

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Why would you spend your time going to a bank to pay a cheque in or queuing in a shop to buy a item that is on the end of a klick of a button ? why employ a load of staff in a office to do something that can be done in your pyjamas at home ?....... that's the way it is and you will not change it !  its all down to money and cost !

Yes I was very disappointed to read of the demise of Clay Shooting magazine, I hope Sporting Gun maintains a good level of clay shooting content. I know YouTube is the future and I do like TSC, TGS, Lloyd Pattinson etc but I still like reading many of the articles in the magazine, recently I felt they had got some good contributors.

Yet I am led to believe that the “Clay Shooter” publication, which is a free at source, no cost magazine, available at most Shooting Grounds again from April continues to publish? This magazine has been around for a few years now, I should imagine this hastened the demise of Clay Shooting, the opportunity to simply pick up a magazine whilst at a Shooting Ground every month, no commitments no subscription required would be difficult to compete with. I am aware that any clay shooting information and entertainment you might want is available via the media, You Tube, Facebook, Instagram Twitter, and a great amount of instructional information is extremely well done by Ben Husthwaite in particular, but the tactile feel of physically reading a paper copy of the magazine/book was (is) something I prefer personally, perhaps it’s an age thing......

I subscribe to readly and get all the shooting magazine's for £7.99 a month digitally plus hundreds more and all the back copies, this I suspect is one of the reasons paper copies will die 

Trout and Salmon combined with Trout Fisherman some months back...................to the detriment of BOTH magazines.

Obviously with a price increase  !

i discovered many years ago  that a years subscription  covers most shooting situations  in most mags ,   excluding new items and reviews etc ,   so yes i suspect mags in general have had their day !!    youtube  is all you need  !  

You feel safe reading a magazine on the loo, with my poor digital world ability I'd end up reading the tablet on the loo and sharing it with the world

But that's probably an age thing too

I don’t think it’s so much that printed media has had its day. Magazine and newspaper sales across the board are respectable if not what they were 10 years ago.

Clay Shooting’s problem, rather like this website, is that there’s nothing more left to say. Their contributors rehash old articles with a slightly different slant and call it new content. It’s not and people are seeing through it.

I think we’ve all done a good job talking about very little so widely for 4 months now. It will have to be real content from now on.

Every time periodicals and “Specialist” magazines are forced to combine recourses and output, the one being absorbed seems to gradually evaporate, disappearing without trace, was it ever thus!

Will Hewland said:

I think we’ve all done a good job talking about very little so widely for 4 months now. It will have to be real content from now on.

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I Couldn’t agree more! Nicely put Will!

For some years now the only magazine that I subscribe to is “ The Field “ .  It’s one of the few general interest sporting magazine that had articles of general interest , quality photography and isn’t packed full  “groundhog days “ .  It’s also printed on quality paper and that’s part of the reading experience. The object of a magazine should be to entertain , and once they stop entertaining people stop buying . 

MartynB said:

For some years now the only magazine that I subscribe to is “ The Field “ .  It’s one of the few general interest sporting magazine that had articles of general interest , quality photography and isn’t packed full  “groundhog days “ .  It’s also printed on quality paper and that’s part of the reading experience. The object of a magazine should be to entertain , and once they stop entertaining people stop buying . 

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That ones merging with shooting gazette.

Lots of good points here.

The internet has not just affected "printed matter" & created cheap to distribute PDFs but also added the availability of You Tube presenters such as TGS & Lloyd Pattinson. The fact that we can see & hear their straighforward reviews and comments is much more informative, particularly when you have enough knowledge yourself to appreciate what they are saying. Just as important however is that both TGS & LP are honest in terms of the pros & cons of what they review such that whilst we all have different opinions I believe them when they say a gun, glasses, whatever, has good or bad features & quality etc. As we have commented before the magazines review to please the manufacturers.

I would add the same about some of the videos on shooting technique (CPSA, BH, Chris Batha etc) in that whether we like the style of presentation matters not - a video allows us to see things clearly and in a way we can understand.

On another thread mention has been made of Rich Coles 25 minute You Tube video of the Beretta 694. He takes it to pieces, discusses the metal types, fit and reasons behind the design changes. That cannot be matched in a magazine both in terms of his knowledge and also seeing inside the working parts of the gun. Why would you read a magazine review when that sort of resoource is available on line through a video taken on a phone and quickly posted on the interweb.

Having said all of the above, the CPSA magazine is invaluable for its local knowledge and comment. Its a credit to the CPSA that they pull that all together and make it available in one location.