Total Film is shutting down. It's over. http://217.14.221.211/index.php?opti...id=26&Itemid=1Any word on when the next issue of Total Film drops?
Before we even attempt to tackle that question, we owe our readers a quick thank you.
To our readers: the crew here at Total Film wants to say thanks for sticking with us. Over the last 24 issues, you’ve proven that you know how to spot quality when it hits your doorstep. We were honestly surprised by the reception to the film school project—we didn't have high expectations, but you guys embraced it. Plus, the new magazine layout is clearly working, considering sales are hitting all-time highs.
So, it happened after all. (click "Read more..." for the rest of the story)
Nobody probably ever told you this simple truth: magazines don't survive on readers. They live on advertising. That’s how it works. Even Total Film—a publication where quality actually costs something, from the heavy, premium paper stock to the exclusive licensed content and the editorial staff—relies on that engine to stay afloat.
To be more precise, every single issue of the magazine runs us about... $33 That's just to get it onto newsstands. It doesn't even touch the sales tax, marketing campaigns, promotions, or any other overhead. A massive chunk of the budget gets swallowed up by printing costs alone—and honestly, you can't even break even on that through sales.
So, why don't we just hike up the magazine prices?
Total Film should probably be priced around... $25 By those numbers, you could live solely off the sales.
Take that price and strip away the 22% tax and the 35% retail markup from the newsstands. Then you'll see what we actually walk away with.
Who would even bother buying a magazine at that price point? $25Hands up... yeah, all five of you.
From a marketing standpoint, hiking the price that much would just kill the magazine. Period. Advertising becomes a necessity.
Look, since our former editor-in-chief walked out, we lost our main distributor's backing. We had to hunt for ad space elsewhere. We put in the work—as you all know, we pushed hard to get coverage on the radio, TV, and in the papers. We launched new initiatives and shifted our entire strategy. We’re moving away from just serving the Hollywood machine and focusing on serving our readers instead.
We got a mountain of rejections. The editorial office's filing cabinet is overflowing with marketing pitches that all met the same fate: "Thanks, but we're not interested." We can't exactly claim we didn't try, though. Here are a few examples.
We tried cutting a deal with some major film distributors to include movie posters inside the magazine. Our readers—especially the cinephiles—would have loved it. It was a win-win on paper; the distributors get direct advertising for their upcoming releases, and our side would handle the packaging and shipping if they provided the posters. It didn't go well. Some distributors flat-out claimed they didn't have the budget for printing. Others were even more blunt, telling us they weren't interested in that kind of marketing at all. Of course, suddenly everyone became very interested once we suggested that we could cover the costs for the printing, insertion, and distribution ourselves. Typical.
Just to set the record straight, our relationship with distributors was never as smooth as people might think. We dealt with payment delays and information gaps pretty regularly, though we always managed to iron things out in the end. The messiest part was when Universal Pictures took offense over an article we ran regarding DVD piracy. They dug their heels in and flat-out refused to work with us—except, of course, for sending us movies to review. That’s fine by me. It's their right, just as it's ours to write what matters to our readers rather than catering to the distributors.
For over a year, we’ve been grinding away at the logistics of bundling DVDs with our magazine. We branded the whole thing as a "genuine gift to our readers." The goal was simple: give people extra value without hiking up the cover price or resorting to those cheap "buy one, get one" gimmicks you see all other media outlets running. Our idea was to provide the reader with... $8.25 They're handing over both the magazine and the DVD, no strings attached. Word is, other media outlets started scrambling once they caught wind of what we're planning.
The cost for an operation like this wasn't steep—roughly $10,000. The gold sponsor gets their branding, space for promotional materials on the DVD, and an ad in the magazine, all while securing the funding we need to actually pull this project off. You’d think anyone with half a brain wouldn't pass up such cheap, high-quality advertising. Hmm. It seems America isn't exactly a genius nation—not one major player showed interest in the project, even though they were simultaneously burning massive budgets on traditional ad campaigns. Or maybe we're just being naive.
It's a shame. A move like that would have definitely shaken up a market that currently tries to sell you DVDs at what we consider to be standard market prices—all while acting like they're doing you a favor.
Then there's our little film school project. While it wasn't designed to be a commercial venture, we figured our contribution to American film culture might attract a sponsor. We thought $6.00 per episode was a fair price, especially since the school would carry the sponsor's name. Honestly, we don't care about the money as much as we care about passing this knowledge on to our readers. But no. Not here either—crickets. We've been told repeatedly that companies find it more profitable to advertise in mass-market women's magazines than in a publication with a specialized, sophisticated audience. Culture? Who cares!
So, here we are. Two years of publishing high-quality material hasn't yielded the financial results needed to justify continuing the story. In the cramped American film industry, which is already in a deep crisis, the potential departure of Total Film won't just affect our readers and film buffs.
Then again, who knows? We're suspending the magazine until we find a way to scrape together the $1,500 a month required to cover overhead. Will we succeed?
Maybe—if someone recognizes the value of this magazine and its readership. But judging by our failure to find sponsors for the film school, advertisers couldn't care less about us, about you, or about film culture.
Want to help? We'll be posting our rate card on the website soon. Anyone who secures an ad for us will receive 10% of the ad's value as a reward. If we can land 15 pages of prepaid ads, we keep going. And then we see how far we can take it.
