Canadian Magazine Industry News
3 March 2011,     VANCOUVER
Momentum celebrates 50th issue with redesign to reach wider audience
Independently-published bike magazine Momentum recently celebrated its 50th issue by launching a new look in print and online.

The 50th issue and new look of Momentum magazine
The 50th issue and new look of Momentum magazine


Designed with Arizona-based Switch Studio, Momentum changed the look of its brand from top to bottom, said publisher, marketing and advertising director Mia Kohout. “We wanted to launch a new look to make the magazine a little more mainstream, reach a wider audience,” she said. “Before the look was a little niche-y.”

Kohout decribed Momentum's old look as too
Kohout decribed Momentum's old look as too "grassroots"


Kohout said Momentum’s target audience is conscientious urban professionals aged 25-55. Its new tagline, “Smart living by bike” reflects the audience the magazine wants to attract, she said. The former tagline was “The magazine for self-propelled people.”

Switch Studio president and creative director Jim Nissen said Momentum’s new logo was designed to look like an overlapping set of cultures, which resemble bike lanes and bike parking. “The magazine’s name, Momentum was put in a circle because we needed a logo that can be used for sponsorship and promotion,” he said. “The overlay of the colours on the logo makes the logo easy to change with the seasons. Before it was a one-colour logo.”

There was a conscious choice with the new design to appeal to magazine’s 30% female readership without alienating male readers, said Nissen. “A lot of the language in the old design was about cogs and chains,” he said. “We decided that if it gets greasy we don’t want to talk about it.”

Momentum has a circulation of 30,000, 5,000 of which are paid copies, said Kohout. Because the magazine is either mailed, or picked up in shops the new design needed to be multi-functional, said Nissen. “Momentum is not a newsstand magazine so the look of the cover needed to be something that could handle a mailing label and also look good enough to be picked up in coffee stores and shops.”

Momentum magazine is published in Vancouver and available in “bike-friendly cities” across North America.


— Val Maloney
Story Tools
Most Recent News Comment
Jaded says:
Wow, Torstar really seems to be on a mission to bankrupt one magazine after another....
Most Recent Blog Comment
Lorene Shyba says:
Full of terrific information, Thanks!...
Special Reports
Masthead Web Edition Archives
More Archives