New Look Urban Life: The Verdict
The new look Urban Life landed on my desk today. Firstly the clubbing related mistakes in their very basic clubs section.
1) Ascension, that superclub that used to be in the northern quarter, closed down years ago (It's now the Mint Lounge).
2) Billie Rox has also closed down.
The Verdict
Urban Life was a gash mag that was occasionally useful. It's primary focus was property, with a few choice articles thrown in between the adverts for estate agents. Owners MEN have revamped it, expanding it to eighty two pages, including adverts, and extending the remit to cover restaurants, interviews, music, and other Manc related writings.
Even looking at the finished product it's hard to tell if the MEN are serious about this mag, or if they just felt the need to head off their competitors. You get the feeling that anyone could have produced this magazine, in fact I wager that a group of sixth formers (given the correct brief, and a copy of Microsoft Publisher) could have pulled this one off. It jumps around, covering the MEN's campaign against water bottles (right idea, ish), St Georges Day, the best sun tan lotions, and an advertorial on Manchester 235, and, in their words, two pages on "the cream and the cack" that's been sent to their offices.
The bumf last week promised a new look magazine closer to the old City Life, with less emphasis on the property and more on entertainment in Manchester. The problem is that 42% of the magazine is still taken up by property section, with another thirteen pages of property ads dotted throughout the mag and an interesting article on buying property...in Montenegro. That's 56% property.
The new restaurants section is now just two and a half pages, taken over by a very basic list of restaurants, and the new clubs section is less than two pages, with another incomplete, and incorrect, list of venues in Manchester. I never see the value in these basic lists, especially when they're wrong.
The relaunch reminds me of a campaign run by the now defunct City Life many years ago that stated "If it's on in Manchester, then it's in City Life", whilst at the same time they had cut down the size of their clubbing section.
After all the fuss, I can't help wondering what's so good about this new mag, but then again, maybe it was never meant to be that good.
1) Ascension, that superclub that used to be in the northern quarter, closed down years ago (It's now the Mint Lounge).
2) Billie Rox has also closed down.
The Verdict
Urban Life was a gash mag that was occasionally useful. It's primary focus was property, with a few choice articles thrown in between the adverts for estate agents. Owners MEN have revamped it, expanding it to eighty two pages, including adverts, and extending the remit to cover restaurants, interviews, music, and other Manc related writings.
Even looking at the finished product it's hard to tell if the MEN are serious about this mag, or if they just felt the need to head off their competitors. You get the feeling that anyone could have produced this magazine, in fact I wager that a group of sixth formers (given the correct brief, and a copy of Microsoft Publisher) could have pulled this one off. It jumps around, covering the MEN's campaign against water bottles (right idea, ish), St Georges Day, the best sun tan lotions, and an advertorial on Manchester 235, and, in their words, two pages on "the cream and the cack" that's been sent to their offices.
The bumf last week promised a new look magazine closer to the old City Life, with less emphasis on the property and more on entertainment in Manchester. The problem is that 42% of the magazine is still taken up by property section, with another thirteen pages of property ads dotted throughout the mag and an interesting article on buying property...in Montenegro. That's 56% property.
The new restaurants section is now just two and a half pages, taken over by a very basic list of restaurants, and the new clubs section is less than two pages, with another incomplete, and incorrect, list of venues in Manchester. I never see the value in these basic lists, especially when they're wrong.
The relaunch reminds me of a campaign run by the now defunct City Life many years ago that stated "If it's on in Manchester, then it's in City Life", whilst at the same time they had cut down the size of their clubbing section.
After all the fuss, I can't help wondering what's so good about this new mag, but then again, maybe it was never meant to be that good.
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