#callingspots

Why print media still matters.

By Paul Cargill

Over the last decade we have seen a huge decline in traditional print media. Sales of newspapers and magazines have been steadily declining for years with titles closing monthly. Wrestling is no different and just last year in the UK Power Slam magazine closed it’s doors. The very medium that I am publishing this article on is obviously a factor but, in 2015, is there still a place for print media in wrestling?

For the last 10 years I have been a subscriber to the Wrestling Observer. Widely acknowledged as the bible of professional wrestling it has been reporting the news and results of wrestling from around the world for decades and is released weekly. The frequency of the news and stories in wrestling lend itself quite well to a weekly publication. Combine that with Dave Meltzer’s unlimited sources and dedication you have the most successful publication in wrestling. What makes it even more amazing is you cannot buy it in shops or at newsstands. In the early 2000’s the newsletter was briefly available through email but it was still a postal subscription service up until the 2008 merger with Figure Four Weekly. Since then it has been available online every Thursday night.

This is how I have acquired all my wrestling information for the last decade. It is how many people have. With such amazing information available on demand where can the humble magazine compete? The internet was meant to kill off books but after a few years sales have stabilised and over the last 18 months sales of physical books have slightly increased and e-books have only taken 30% of the market. The appetite for physical media still exists. Despite having a complete digital library of music and movies I have never switched to digital copies of books. I still enjoy holding a book and turning pages.

If wrestling magazines are to survive then they need to evolve. Reporting results is a slow process and is horribly out of date by the time a publication reaches newsstands when people can watch G1 Finals from Japan live online. So where do you go?

One magazine trying to do something different is “Calling Spots” a UK based publication. Now in it’s 18th issue and seemingly going from strength to strength with the launch of Wrestle Crate UK I asked Editor Richard Penaluna about the magazine and his influences.

Why did you decide to start the magazine?

I started the magazine for a myriad of different reasons; from a selfish perspective, I'd been writing articles for various wrestling websites for many years but wasn't seeing the feedback since it wasn't my website and with social media not being as rife as it is today. If I was going to put my heart and soul into a piece of writing then I at least wanted to have my finger on the pulse of my readers, knowing what they loved and hated. Away from this, I felt that I'd identified a gap in the market. At a time when every man and his dog has a website - some brilliant and some not so much - I felt that the extra passion, time, commitment, skill, artistic flair and money involved in making a printed publication would make Calling Spots "different" from the get go. Add to this the fact that I felt there was very little to get excited about (at the time) in the world of printed wrestling media. FSM is very good, but none of the alternatives (WWE Magazine, Power Slam, Pro Wrestling Illustrated) at that point in time made me want to run out and read them each month. But then you could walk into a comic shop and see an awesome fanzine about the most random of subjects. In the early days that was what gave me confidence that I could create a printed magazine.

What were your influences in starting the magazine as from what I've seen and read it reminds me of classic British football/music fanzines?

Yeah that's definitely an astute observation. I read every wrestling magazine I can get my hands on, from the biggest glossy magazine to the smallest upstart fanzine, for the sole purpose of being aware of what they're doing and ensuring Calling Spots is different. My influences all come from outside of wrestling. I grew up reading a fanzine which covered my local football team - Newcastle United - called True Faith. True Faith was an A5-sized printed magazine which covered a mix of recent football events, the history of the club, but also completely off topic subjects that were linked to the football sub-culture, such as music and clothing. Most importantly, it was written by fans of the football club. Because of this, they always had a love of Newcastle United entrenched in the heart of each piece of writing they published. Even when the subject matter in question was negative, it was written with NUFC's success as the focus and always provided alternative solutions or ways of thinking. The design of the magazine was always on point with fresh cover designs that fit in with current affairs, both inside and outside of the club, mixed with artwork and awesome photography. True Faith no longer prints, which is very sad, but they were definitely my first influence. Now I get my inspiration from glossy high end magazines, looking at things like page layouts, typography, interesting subject matter and how they engage their readers. 8by8 Magazine is a US based football magazine that I'm very much inspired by currently but I'll generally just get myself into comic shops, WH Smiths and online looking for cool-looking magazines.

What was the biggest challenge?

That's a tough one; we had such modest goals in the early days that there was never an unachievable ambition that set us back. I'm blessed to have a team of some of the most incredibly talented people in my team. I don't want to name names, purely because I'd hate to miss somebody out, but within my team I am so lucky to have a photographer who has won the highest award in his field because of his wrestling photography, some of the most brilliant freelance artists from all across the world (including the UK, US, France and Mexico) and a team of writers who are the perfect blend of university-taught journalists and young, hungry up-and-coming writers that are so good that I never get a look in these days in terms of writing an article - they're much better than I could even dream of being. To your question - the biggest challenge over the past three years has been keeping everybody happy. I'm eternally grateful to all of the former members of my team for their contributions but it was certainly a challenge dealing with situations such as people disappearing from the face of the earth after writing part one of a multi-part article, graphic designers leaving the team one day before print day, delaying hundreds of readers orders and even a former team member threatening to fight me due to their content not being published one issue. Of those things, the latter sounds the "worst" but, looking back, it says something that this projects means enough to somebody who was involved in it to drive them to have such strong emotions.

How did you decide on the balance of print/online material since most wrestling journalism has moved online?

Easy, other than time-relevant content such as DVD or the occasional show review for our media partners I put nothing online and everything I can into print. The magazine is available as a digital download but I'm very vocal about Calling Spots being a printed magazine. Our readers understand that too as only 10% of our subscribers are digital-only subscribers.

How has the growth of the magazine been?

Unbelievable. I mean, I'm sure my numbers are modest when compared to FSM and suchlike but when I released issue 1 my goal was to sell 40 magazines. The fact that we now sell thousands of magazines and ship them all over the world absolutely blows my mind. This was only meant to be a hobby haha.

How did you decide on the price point? What originally made me order a copy was how cheap it was and that hooked me.

Basically I charge as little as I can for Calling Spots. The magazine has been self sufficient since day one with any extra profit going into growing the magazine - allowing us to advertise, create new products, etc. I am very aware of how hard people work for their money. As I said before, it blows my mind that people pay their hard earned cash to read it. For that reason I will always keep the cost as low as I can. It breaks my heart that international readers have to pay £4.50 per single issue in shipping alone! Price is very important to me, which is part of the reason I've not yet made the magazine full colour, because I would need to increase the magazine price by £1 and I would rather the pound stayed in my readers pocket instead of my printers. Don't tell my printer that though.