I am happy to announce the relaunch of WALK Magazine! 

With a new logo and color scheme, this relaunch is entirely electronic focusing on both the WALK Blog and Podcast.

You may be wondering why now. Well, it’s taken me awhile to come to grips with the folding of the magazine. 

The History of WALK! Magazine

The idea for WALK! Magazine started during the drive to the Indy Mini Marathon with a group of walking friends. As we talked about Runner’s World and other running-related things, we asked why there wasn’t a magazine for walkers. I thought about it for quite a while and asked for opinions from several people (many in publishing) whose opinions I trusted. I’d been a magazine editor for 20 years, and with so much positive feedback I knew I could do it.

While trying to figure out how to get it started, I mentioned the idea somewhere online, and before I knew it, I had 200 subscribers and had not published a single word! Without much of a plan, I had subscribers all across the United States, Canada, and several European countries as well as New Zealand. 

After I started publishing, it didn’t take long until there were nearly 4,000 subscribers! 

During those days, I was working 40 hours a week at my full-time job, then coming home to write, edit, and layout the magazine. I often worked 60 to 80 hours a week between my paying job and the magazine. 

I traveled to race expos all over the United States promoting the magazine. Some race directors even asked me to be a guest speaker at their expos. I loved traveling to present the Best City for Walkers awards sponsored by WALK! Magazine. 

So many friends helped me! My friends not only subscribed and bought shirts, they helped with bookkeeping, set up subscriber databases, wrote features, and even traveled to races with me to help with the booth. (I can never thank all of them enough!)

My family helped with proofreading, headline writing, mailings, and photography. And they put up with my traveling and missing sporting events, prom, and more.

Going Well Until…

Things were going so well and I was convinced it was going to work. I was confident WALK! Magazine was going to be the Runner’s World for walkers. (I met Runner’s World’s Bart Yasso at the Cincinnati Flying Pig Marathon expo and told him that.)

In 2008 as we were making plans for me to quit my job and devote all of my time to WALK! Magazine, the recession hit. Our personal finances were affected and we needed my income. And at a point when subscriptions should be growing and ad revenue should start coming in, it wasn’t.

Growing Too Fast and Too Slow

What added to the money issues is that WALK! grew too fast and too slow at the same time. The original plan was to publish regionally and eventually grow into a national publication. Because of the interest across the country, I threw out my plan and decided to be national immediately. 

In hindsight I can see that was a huge mistake. To me several thousand subscribers was a lot, but to advertisers it wasn’t enough. Sure, companies were happy to send samples for the holiday gift buying guide or the shoe review issue, but not buy ads. National companies were not going to waste their time on such a small subscription base. Local companies would have been interested in a publication with 4,000 “local” readers, but my readers were spread out across the country.

I pushed hard to increase subscribers. I kept thinking, more people was all I needed. Though subscriptions did increase, it was a little too little, a little too late.

We thought about switching to an e-magazine or getting investors. Nothing was going to work and folding ended up being the only option.

Folding WALK! Magazine

I was heartbroken! I had worked for nearly 5 years building what could have been an amazing magazine, but circumstances… 

The hurt was tremendous! I ended up folding the magazine with barely a word to anyone and owing so many people more than I could ever pay them. 

In my mind, I was a complete and total failure.

Despite all of the hurt, in the back of my mind I wondered if somehow I could bring back some part of WALK! Magazine. I tried to continue blogging and podcasting, but it wasn’t consistent enough to be worthwhile.

Remembering the Good

Time has passed and, though it sometimes still hurts, I can now look back on WALK! Magazine, that I built from scratch, and remember how much I enjoyed it. I loved interviewing people and writing about them. It was so exciting receiving columns from Tim, Dave, and Bonnie. Very talented friends wrote moving features. And trying out products for the gift guide and reviewing races I walked with friends was a lot of fun.

I never want to do another print publication, but what about working to make the blog and podcast something special?

Trying Something New

A few months ago I decided if I’m going to do something, I need to do it right. I had a new logo designed, I recorded a couple new podcasts to see how it felt, and I started being more active online. It felt really good! 

On a whim I started WALK’s 30-day 60-mile Challenge and was floored by the positive responses. More than 170 people participated! That reinforced that this is the time to try again.

What’s to Come

And that is a long story to say, I’m relaunching the WALK Magazine Blog and Podcast.

Right now the plan is to produce one podcast a month and a blog post every week. If things work out well, or I suddenly have more to say, you’ll see more content. 

Let me know if there are people you want to see interviewed or topics you would like to see covered. I do plan to revisit some of the old articles in a “where are they now.”

Thanks again to everyone past and present who has supported and found encouragement from WALK Magazine. I can’t wait to see what this next era brings!

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