Auto Age Drives Home Hard Facts : Industry Magazine Geared Toward ‘Educating’ Car Dealers
The television image of auto dealers as good ol’ boys in cowboy hats notwithstanding, selling cars is serious business. And Auto Age, a magazine designed for car dealers, tries to appeal to the pinstriped side of every got-to-move-the-inventory-today Wild Bill.
“With hundreds of employees and millions in inventory, friendly neighborhood car dealers have to think of themselves as the CEOs of medium-sized corporations,” said Jack Mayne, editor of the Van Nuys-based monthly. “We help them do that.”
Many of Auto Age’s 32,000 subscribers, Mayne said, are former car salesmen who became dealers without ever attending college or receiving formal business training. He said those readers often look to the magazine as a key source of information on topics such as buying computer systems or planning inventory.
Keeping Up With Trends
Mayne said his mission is to “educate” dealers about trends in the business that could affect them. For example, he cited a recent two-part series examining the dealership franchise system. The articles suggest that manufacturers want to eliminate dealerships so they can sell directly to consumers.
“I’m not going to write happy articles about our biggest advertisers,” said Mayne, 49, a self-described hard-news man who once was Associated Press bureau chief in Boston and a city editor for the Seattle Post-Intelligencer.
He heads an editorial staff of four in Van Nuys. The magazine also uses two free-lance writers, including one in Washington who writes a regular column.
The magazine has its detractors. Gary James, managing editor of Automotive Executive, a competitor that is published by the National Automobile Dealers Assn., says his publication is better because it’s more on top of news from Washington.
Article on Dealers’ Image
In any case, a feature in the August issue of Auto Age on the public image of auto dealers used Gallup Poll findings that only 5% of the American public believe car salesmen have high ethical standards, contrasted with 31% for funeral directors and 67% for clergymen.
The issue also had a column on odometer tampering and a review of light utility vehicles that said some consumers polled by the magazine about the Isuzu Trooper II found it “plain ugly” and “Spartan.”
Mayne said that, even though Auto Age has offended and lost some advertisers, it always has made money. He said, however, that the magazine, like many trade publications, once routinely published stories to please advertisers.
Freed Crown Lee, the company that publishes Auto Age, wouldn’t disclose its profits from the magazine. But the company said the magazine, its principal holding, brought in revenue of $1.65 million last year, up 73% from two years before.
Under Mayne’s direction, the magazine has been slowly redesigned. With the July issue, bolder graphics and larger type were introduced, and the name was shortened from Automotive Age to Auto Age.
Sent to 24,000 Dealerships
Most of the revenue comes from advertisers, since 95% of the magazines are sent free to the nation’s 24,000 auto dealerships, which sometimes get more than one copy. For paying subscribers, the charge is $26 annually.
Auto Age’s advertisers include companies that provide manufacturer- or dealer-installed auto accessories. General Motors’ tilting steering-wheel option, plastic truck-bed liners and auto alarms all were advertised in a recent issue.
Along with Automotive Executive, which is distributed to the dealer association’s 19,500 members, Auto Age’s competitors include Automotive News, a 65,000-circulation weekly that reports on the entire car industry.
Automotive News, which its competitors begrudgingly acknowledge as the industry bible because of its newsier approach, lists nearly every car dealer in the U.S. as a paid subscriber.
Freed Crown Lee, which employs 30 people in Van Nuys, also publishes Motorcycle Product News for 14,000 motorcycle dealers. The company once published magazines for bicycle dealers and travel agents, but both lasted only two years, failing in 1984.
Auto Age, which accounts for 70% to 75% of the Freed Crown Lee’s revenue, was founded 20 years ago by Joseph Crown’s brother Allen, a one-time newspaper advertising salesman who now is the company’s treasurer. Allen Crown wanted a magazine he could aim at his biggest advertisers, car dealers.
At first, Automotive Age was sent only to California dealers. In 1972, the magazine merged with a competitor published by Kelley Blue Book, the used-car price guide. Irvine-based Kelley Blue Book still handles circulation for Auto Age, although it holds no interest in the magazine.
