Thoughts About R/C Report

Having been an on and off subscriber to R/C Report since its inception in 1986, I've always looked forward to finding the latest issue in my mailbox. On a brisk March afternoon of 2009,  I opened the mail box door and there it was! The latest issue of R/C Report had landed! YES! Not wising to disturb the mass of junk mail covering R/C Report, I located the center of of the magazine and grabbed it with my thumb and forefinger. I gave it a swift, David Copperfield like pull and the magazine was convincingly freed from its metal crypt! A quick scan of the cover revealed something horribly wrong. “No Way!” I said. The words I read were as painful as Jocasta's dress pins to Oedipus' eyes! “OUR FINAL AND “FAREWELL” ISSUE!”                                              “So long, friends, and thanks for the ride.” Obviously, I had to know more about how and why my magazine subscription had suddenly come to such an abrupt, unexpected end. I grabbed the remaining mail from the mailbox and quickly dashed inside the house.  Turning to the editor’s page, I was hoping Gordon Banks would give an explanation of why I was holding the last issue of R/C Report. Gordon delivered. Gordon's Explanation Gordon Banks, founder and editor of R/C Report, thanked his business associates and gave his faithful readers a heartfelt, salient, eight page explanation of why the magazine was closing its doors. Getting right to the point, Gordon stated without equivocation: “Due mainly to poor business management on my part, and an ailing economy”...”we are unable to continue publishing”. There it is. Admittedly, I was a little angry. “Poor business management on my part”? So what segment of business management was so poor R/C Report was forced to close its doors? It was the failure to raise subscription prices when confronted with rising printing costs—and the loss of advertisers because of an “ailing economy”. Okay, stuff happens. I'm over it. Honest, I am. At any rate, the magazines closure was somewhat more complicated than a one simple sentence explanation. Perhaps being stiffed for almost 18K by advertisers who were unable to pay their bills didn’t help matters either. But hey, we’re not here to to discuss business acumen. In reverse order of importance, here are three reasons why R/C Report was one of the best magazines published for the R/C enthusiast. 3. R/C Report readers said it was the best. A blatant appeal to authority here. Just because magazine readers said it was the best, was it really the best? Well, yes it was.  Modelers who purchase and read R/C magazines are the authorities. Readers typically subscribe to more than one R/C magazine (I subscribed to three at the same time for a number of years), making comparisons between publications easy. Gordon states: “In fact, in every R/C magazine survey I saw. R/C Report was always voted the best”. Modelers also wrote R/C Report was the “only magazine they trusted”. Moreover, one “candid individual” who preferred more advertising and glossy pictures plainly stated it was the “one honest magazine out there” with “great writers”. 2. Magazine content. What’s contained in a magazine is just as important as what’s not contained in a magazine. Gordon states in his final editorial ”I didn’t want R/C Report to become another monthly catalog with maybe 70% of the pages devoted to advertising ...only two of our 272 issues went over 40% ads, and none hit 50%!” A simple formula. If the ad content increased, the magazine content increased to stay below the 40% target. As time passed, some columns were dropped and others added, but the magazine was devoted to substantive content. Regular columns appeared on a monthly basis. feature articles, and product test reports were part of the monthly line up. For those who cared to read, R/C report represented the best value on the market. The February/March 2009 issues contained no less than 19 product reviews! 1. R/C Report refused to make deals with advertisers. What sort of deals did R/C Report turn down? Gordon states in his editorial: “From the very beginning we refused to make deals with advertisers who wanted guaranteed favorable product test reports.” He also points out that  some advertisers “wanted the right to see and edit our reviews of their products before they were published”. As word spread that R/C Report “couldn’t be bought”,some advertisers pulled their ads when a unfavorable product review was published—with some refusing to pay their current advertising bill!   When taking informal polls of modelers it was discovered modelers wanted “honest test reports”, “helpful information” and a magazine that was “fun to read”. To this end, R/C Report was incredibly successful and unequivocally delivered a superior product by adhering to Gordon’s no compromise, honorable vision for the magazine. Final Thoughts. So, did an uncompromising vision equate to keeping enough advertisers happy? Unfortunately no, nor did it equate to an expanding subscription list. But one has to wonder—if R/C report changed it’s format to a full glossy and capitulated to advertisers would the pretty picture folks have bought it and kept the magazine alive? Who knows, but I have little doubt the subscribers who enjoyed reading would have supported the magazine—as long as content was king, despite the glossy pretty picture format. If you’re reading this, chances are you were a subscriber or regular reader of  R/C Report. Sure, we don’t mind the pretty pictures now and then, but we always had other venues to check those out. We, in fact, had time to read and actually enjoyed reading and learning—which was part of the R/C Report experience. Surviving back issues are still worth reading today for useful information, honest test reports, and the occasional laugh. What remains is Gordon’s publishing legacy—inexorably linked with those who helped him fulfill his dream. The dream is encapsulated in 272 issues of R/C Report—272 issues of hard work, giving the meat and potato modelers what they asked for. The final issue of R/C Report thanked its readers for the ride. As a reader and friend of R/C Report I want to thank Gordon Banks. It wasn’t just a ride— it was a great ride! Fly Safe! John W. Blossick johnb@tslidehaven.com November 2017