Shopkeeper Interview

How many magazines are for sale?

Here in this small newsagent we have 25 magazines ranging from Woman’s cooking to Men’s Rifling, we even have a small range of children’s magazines.

How many different genres do you stock?

For music genres we have mainstream pop, rock and metal, 7 different magazines in total.

Which genre of magazine sells the best?

Out of all the music magazines, we have lots of alternative teenagers coming in looking at our heavy metal magazines such as Metal Hammer and Kerrang and because of that Kerrang is our best seller.

Are there any magazines you would like to stock in the future?

In the future we would like to stock more gardening magazines, as we are a newsagent we get lots of elderly customers in getting their newspapers, they would easily be attracted to the gardening magazines.

How are the magazines positioned in the store?

We have the kids magazines right in front of the door as children are instantly attracted with any toy or colorful item they see, once they want something their parents are likely to buy it for them. The more adult based magazines such as fishing magazines are by the counter where the adult would be paying for magazine.

How are the magazines shown on the shelf?

Children’s magazines are on the bottom on there eye level, whilst the adults are up high on theirs.

Do you notice about the positioning of the artists on these magazines?

Yes it would appear the main articles artist is in the center of the magazine, this is clearly because they are who the main story is based on and if they are the main story they must be a big band with a large audience.

Target audience video

Analysis of Kerrang!

Kerrang Analysis on PhotoPeach

What I learnt?

Market Research

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Rate card analysis

At the top we have an up to date rate card by NME inside there is presented reader research, statsistics and reviews. We see there is higher amount of male readers than female, a whole 76% to 26% females. They have even looked into the kind of people their readers are which shows they have taken in information and portrayed a clear picture of who their audience is.

From this I have learnt to take interest into the readers of these genre magazines and who I should be aiming at, I also realised I need to give the readers what they would want for my magazine to go well and to do this I need to do lots of surveys.


At the bottom we have a up to date rate card, which is filled with lots and lots of information but what I found really good was the bullet points by Kerrang which explains what key aspects of the magazine which have made it a success, they have also done some target research on what readers buy and how the magazines affects their purchase.

I have learnt by kerrang that my magazine needs to be part of the music scene and not just an outside voice talking about it, to do that my magazine needs to interact with its readers and involve them in and with the magazine. Aswell as just being about the magazine Kerrang sometimes puts modern day issues into an understandable teenage form making the magazine relate to the world. For all this I need to speak to the target market and ask what they want.

Image analysis

From making this I have created an understanding of what the professional magazines do to make their magazines so good. What types of images they use, how the typoography is and what readers want to see in a magazine

History of Music Magazines

Front Cover Analysis

Institutional Video

Table of magazine publishers

Evaluation

I felt the magazine went well as I had a good lay out from looking at other school magazines, I had good quality images such as the student drinking a drink which fitted the main story of my magazine, I cropped and change the pictures filter which gave it a more warm colour which fit well with my yellow background. My magazine has a clear title and logo and contact information which seems a must have on a magazine. If I were to redo my magazine I would make sure I changed my texts font to a more bubbly and eye catching one, I would also like to have cropped the castle school logo and text at the top so I didn’t have a blue background to it. From this magazine I have learned that good quality images, bold text and a clear lay out is key for a great magazine.

Finished title page

The magazine I created was good but I realised what was needed but it after completion I could clearly see it was not of standard to be sold or distrubuted by a magazine publisher, I then looked into what was needed to make it successful.

Foreground picture editing

By making a mock front cover it helped me learn cropping and background deletion skills which are crucial to making a professional looking magazine.

Mock up contents page

Making my own contents page helped me think about what was needed to create a good contents page and what was needed in it to be successful and helpful to the reader.

Mock up of cover

By making a plan it helped me think about where would be the best place to lay my magazine out, looking at other magazines helped me with this. From this plan I could see how a good magazine should be layed out.

Researching school magazine

This is the front cover of The Castle School magazine. As we can see it has a bold headline title for attention, at the bottom I like how it shows a sneak peak of the contents inside and their page numbers so readers know where the topic they are interested in is. From this magazine I find the high quality background image very captivating.

This school magazine by the Indipendant has a high quality background which showsit is professional, a school logo which premotes the school as it is clearly displayed and a picture of happy students which is large enough to see clearly unlike the magazine above.

This is another front cover of the castle school magazine although this one I find It hasn’t got the quality finish like the one above has. This front gover has lots of images all thrown together in a very boring 3 by 3 grid. The background is white and makes the magazine look more formal and boring which would not attract students.

Henworth Grange school magazine has the school email at the bottom this is a good contact to have as it is easily accessible by the reader. The cover has a mix of fonts and pictures suitable to the school as it has students working and pictures of the school its self.

This magazine is from Whitley Bay High, I find the bubble title writing is very un suited to the magazine its self and does not work for a school magazine as it looks very basic. I like how the magazine has been numbered in issues. On the front cover we see it has what is inside the magazine from looking at past examples this is a good thing to have.










What I learnt?

A good school magazine needs a strong formal professional title, an image of the school as a background or side photo, pictures of students are good to have, showing what you will find inside the magazine and a contact address.