Happy 50th Anniversary Backpacker Magazine!!
Congratz Backpacker Magazine!! They will be having quite the Bash at Trail Days this year!!
Take Time to Watch the Trees Dance with The Wind........Then Join In........
They don't publish a magazine any longer... Correct?
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They printed their last physical issue a few months ago but still exist online. My wife picked up the magazine for me from the grocery store not knowing it was the last issue ever. I enjoyed it, actually made me wish I’d been a subscriber for years.Originally Posted by Countrybois
They don't publish a magazine any longer... Correct?
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I was a long time subscriber (from the forerunner "Wilderness Camping" back in the 1980's) but once they went to a digital publication only, I bowed out. I spend enough time on a computer. Don't need to do so for an outdoor magazine. If that makes me a dinosaur, so be it. I've been accused of worse.
That's all for now. Take care and until next time...be well.
snapper
I was a subscriber long ago before before I moved up to the whites and for few years after. I realized early on that they made a lot of money with ads from equipment manufacturers. Therefore gear reviews tended to be hyperbole that there was always "this years model" that was so much better than "last years model". I ended up just buying last year's model (that was "this years model", last year). They had a certain style on their gear reviews, they tried not to pan anything outright but if I read between the lines it was usually obvious what gear was marginal for outdoor use. They did put me on to some good gear. I bought a Mountainsmith pack and pair of snow shoes based on gear reviews. If they featured a trail or an area I knew to wait a few years before going there.
At one point they did a TV series and it was one long commercial filmed outdoors in really nice locations. They did one of these shows near me (Spring Hiking in the Whites) and I got a lot of details on their questionable tactics and outright staged shots used for filming the show including illegal use of a helicopter to shuttle supplies (they got fined for it). It wasnt much longer that I let the subscription lapse. The magazine did have some good writers that also had the right "look" in photos, attractive Ken and Barbie hikers (normal or ugly people must not spend much time in the backcountry). Ultimately a lot of "hiker porn" but for the years when I was not living in the whites, a substitute.
I subscribed for a few years. I agree with the statements made above. Most any of the cottage vendors I know of, have better, lighter products than what the mag tested as "NEW AND IMPROVED". I did enjoy some of the articles about stuff like getting hurt in the back country, SAR's, stuff like that. I let it lapse a few years ago.
For a couple of bucks, get a weird haircut and waste your life away Bryan Adams....
Hammock hangs are where you go into the woods to meet men you've only known on the internet so you can sit around a campfire to swap sewing tips and recipes. - sargevining on HF
Yeah, it's the way all businesses are ran, beer, bourbon, cigars, shoes, clothes, etc., Backpacker is paid to market products. Randy Propster "tag along" who runs the "get out more" for Backpacker and is the major player at Trail Days and has the main BIG giveaway is there to promote all of the newest products and does a Great Job giving things away as well as educating everyone on LNT, the newest gear and backpacking trends. Real Standup Guy!!
Take Time to Watch the Trees Dance with The Wind........Then Join In........
My Dad subscribed for several years and would always pass along his old magazines to me. I enjoyed reading about new places to potentially hike. Still have a stack of their magazines laying around.
I never really paid much attention to their gear reviews since I've pretty much been buying UL/cottage stuff since I got into backpacking. Some YouTube Backpacking channels are just as blatant about batting for the highest bidder.
It is what it is.
Wish I would have kept my old issues by Backpacker...
I still have the first 24 issues (Very Early 80's.) I bought them at a used gear sale about 35 years ago. I recycled all of my 90's/2000 issues as they were taking up a lot of space. But I kept the early 80's. In the beginning, they were much more on substance (longer articles) with fewer advertisements. Now, or at least the last time I read one, everything is written in a mode that reflects a shorter attention span.
.....Someday, like many others who joined WB in the early years, I may dry up and dissapear....
PS. I offered the first 40 issues for free to Rodale Press about 20 years ago, but they passed up on the offer.
.....Someday, like many others who joined WB in the early years, I may dry up and dissapear....
I have the last 20 issues or so. They Iive on my bedside table. I read one and then pull the next one from the bottom of the stack. Probably read each one a half-dozen times
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Written for a short attention span: Very true of many magazines. I used to take several Mustang (Car) magazines and almost all of them merged/quit paper/went belly-up. There is one I still take but it is published by a club so it's part of the dues. They offer printed (I take that) but at a higher cost.
I've got some of these now defunct magazines going back to the 1980's. I've got some Road&Track and Car&Drivers going back to the mid 1970's. I'm wondering if it's even possible to sell them, or just not worth it and find a place to donate them to. Eventually, we need to downsize and boxes of magazines in attics will need to go. Shoot, maybe they are all falling apart anyway.
For a couple of bucks, get a weird haircut and waste your life away Bryan Adams....
Hammock hangs are where you go into the woods to meet men you've only known on the internet so you can sit around a campfire to swap sewing tips and recipes. - sargevining on HF
The best article to ever appear in Backpacker magazine was on their online version on January 24, 2001 titled "This Dog Backpacks And Emails". It was my dog.
I'm the editor and publisher of a print magazine, Georgia Backroads. The magazine is the same size, length, and paper quality as when we began publishing in 1984. The articles are as long and "meaty" as they've ever been. We haven't changed anything. How is a print publication surviving in an ever-increasingly digital world? The main thing is that we've never carried advertising. Advertising, and the decline therein, is what killed the print industry. Basically every publication - magazines and newspapers - relied on advertising to make things work. When advertising began drying up 20 years ago, publications began to shrink and then to disappear. Georgia Backroads has always relied upon subscription, so when advertising dried up, we weren't affected. We're a turtle in a marathon, but we've survived where the rabbits are falling to the side.
I have been a subsecriber to Northern Woodlands Mngazine for 20 years, they seem to thread the needle of having good content and some ads. It owned by non profit.
I lost all my magazines in Hurricane Charley of 2004.
I've been buying back issues off the internet (ebay, etc) that have the articles I found most interesting.
Walk, Stumble, Fall Down - Walk, Stumble, Fall Down - Walk, Stumble, Fall Down - Repeat as many times as necessary until you get it right.
I started getting Backpacker around 1975, and quit it in 1979 when I found its content becoming weaker.
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