Fairfax axes Sport & Style
Fairfax Media has axed its monthly glossy Sport & Style magazine, which had been inserted with The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age, citing market conditions as the reason.
The magazine’s iPad app – the first tablet application developed by Fairfax Media – is also being closed, just six months after being unveiled.
Publisher Lisa Hudson said in a statement: “It is never an easy decision to close any publication, but particularly a magazine of the quality of Sport&Style.”
The 370,000 circulation title – licenced from French title L’Equipe – launched in March last year.
In March this year, Fairfax announced that it was upping the print run and changing the cover stock.
Hudson, said: “Sport & Style achieved editorial standards of the highest calibre and it is with much regret that we are ceasing publication of the magazine. “The Sport & Style team has worked tirelessly and with tremendous focus over the past two years to deliver readers and advertisers a great publication and we would like to thank them for their efforts.
“We would also like to thank our loyal advertisers for their support in the past two years. “Market conditions mean that it is no longer viable for us to continue publishing Sport & Style.”
Hudson added: “I will immediately begin meeting with staff affected by this move to discuss all options for the future.”
Tim Burrowes founded Mumbrella in 2008. He worked on Mumbrella until 2021. At various points he was editor, content director and editor-at-large. He returned to Mumbrella as Publisher in January 2025
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Tis a pity.
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i liked that mag….
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Strange move seeing as it was doing worse revenue wise before now..
Was a great mag though.. better stories and features then 99% of the paid mens mags (Mens Health is the exception).
BL to both Bens
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Great mag. Do you see this as a sign that people are focused too much on iPads rather than building mobile applications?
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I hope the editor Ben McKelvey will find good fortune and a more reliable employer. He is a top editor and a fantastic bloke. Ruggedly handsome, smart, a bon vivant, a raconteur, and most importantly of all he is a man with discerning hip hop taste.
God speed Mr Ben.
(Not a relative or employee, just someone who has cross paths with him a few times)
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Riarn strikes again!
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I absolutely loved that magazine – it really hit the mark with its articles, images & design … and it was free!
Gee, even my missus liked it.
Knew it was too good to be true. Now I’ll have to go out and buy inferior mags.
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In all honesty, I found it boring. It was too high brow and hard to connect with from my perspective but I am sure there was a portion of people who did enjoy it and get something out of it.
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Echo PkD’s sentiments.
Ben’s a great bloke. Sad to hear. Onto bigger and better things for him hopefully.
Great mag too.
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What a shame, Two things stand out – why pay L’equipe the license fee in the first place? and piles of unwanted mags at City stations stick in agency buyers minds.
Still a great product, but needs a cover price and a larger critical mass of upmarket metro men.
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I occasionally buy the weekend papers, but do not ever recall seeing this mag in the Fairfax papers?
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#ffs!
Echo the well-wishes to Ben, talented bloke with only good things in-store for the future. And it could mean more Benny & Richie shows for Bigpond!?!?
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The problem with iPad app was – why pay for it on the iPad when it came for free in the papers? The interactive content was not that great and not reason enough to buy it each month.
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Another great mag bites the dust. Really, really dissappointing move.
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I thought it was a decent mag. Did it have a dedicated sales team or was it sold by the general group? Does anyone have numbers around ipad sales/renewals?
Feels like the more upmarket mens niche is there to be taken …. not a whole lot of options out there in print form or online. Most web ‘male lifestyle’ is linkbait and bikini pics, mag wise it’s not much better.
Problem is modern day sport stars simply NEVER say anything interesting. They’re bland, media-trained and too heavily endorsed. Michael Clarke might think it, but he’s never go to publicly call Ponting a w@nker now, is he?
As valiantly as it tried even S&S hyperbole couldn’t disguise the banality of much of its subject matter. Still, it did feature some great photography, so it’s sad not to see those people’s work any more.
I also find looking at this season’s pea coats about as riveting as ear wax. (But that might just be me. And yes, I’m very badly dressed.)
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What’s going on over there?
Since launching the magazine division about five years ago;
Sport & Style – folded
Travel & Leisure – folded
Chatwood Chase Magazine ( a custom title) – folded
and Good Weekend and Sunday Life down about 30% in page numbers.
I can’t comment on Sydney magazine because my newsagent is too slack to insert it with my home delivery.
It’s a pretty poor effort considering the resources Fairfax has and the number of talented people over there.
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I wonder why the other Sport and Style talkback was closed. Either the non-start of Buck Magazine and Tim being close to it, or the legal minefield of nick howe’s messy dismissal I’m guessing. Either way, poor form.
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Deer John,
An “experiment” is when you either do something new and or original.
What part of a blatant appropriation of a name from another men’s lifestyle mag (that happens to be english like yourself), and content that is aggregated is the “experiment’
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@Ender Tim has nothing to do with Buck. But we imagine he took the comment thread offline because it strayed beyond sensible discussion.
@JonDear Tumblr is melting pot of things we like. A visual smörgåsbord. Try it, you might like it.
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I googled Cad and a Bounder,
you wouldn’t believe who I saw
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‘We’ imagine, do we?
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The only people who use iPads are bloody Poindexter’s anyway (hardly into sport or style), but I feel sorry for the editorial team / staff who’ve lost their jobs.
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Hi Ender (comment 18),
If by “close to it”, you mean, I wrote a story about its launch a year or so ago, then yes, you’ve got me bang to rights.
Or, another declaration of interest, Nik and I both worked for the same company in Dubai at the same time. Admittedly on different titles, in different buildings and I don’t recall us actually meeting while we were out there, but maybe that’s close enough for you.
But actually, the thread was closed for legal reasons.
Cheers,
Tim – Mumbrella