Time Inc. breaks into NASCAR territory
Company introduces Racing Fan magazine
Time Inc. next year will publish two issues of a magazine aimed at NASCAR enthusiasts.
Reprints
Print
Respond
If the magazine, called Racing Fan, succeeds, it will become a monthly publication.
Some surveys conclude that NASCAR is the nation's second-most popular spectator sport after professional football.
There are 35 million NASCAR fans in the United States, and 22 million follow the auto races avidly, says Mark Ford, CEO of Time Inc.'s Time4Media.
Racing Fan will be the only broad-reach magazine for NASCAR devotees.
An independently published magazine, American Thunder, targeted a similar market but closed this fall after publishing for less than a year.
Scott Mowbray, Time4Media's editorial director, says American Thunder devoted about one-half of its editorial pages to non-NASCAR topics.
Racing Fan will be devoted exclusively to NASCAR and its personalities, Mowbray says.
NASCAR remains especially accessible to its fans, he says.
"You can still shake the hand of your driver," Mowbray says.
Racing Fan will offer first-person accounts of NASCAR races by drivers and crew chiefs.
Photo features will illustrate key moments in the sport.
For example, the prototype issue depicts "10 Crashes That Shook NASCAR'S World." Ranking first is the crash that killed driver Dale Earnhardt Sr. at the Daytona 500 in 2001.
Time4Media has no relationship with NASCAR. Talk of tie-ins between the magazine and NASCAR sponsors is premature, Ford says.
The initial newsstand distribution of the magazine will be 250,000 copies, Ford says.
It will sell for $3.99.
A full-page advertisement will cost $10,000.
