Outside Magazine may be dead

[Inky_Wretch]

Twenty staff members were laid off last week. Only one full-time print editor and three online editors remain - along with a bunch of part-time or contract "content creators."

https://www.adventure-journal.com/2025/02/outside-owner-lays-off-large-percentage-of-magazine-staff/

This is a damn shame, because for a lot of years Outside was one of the best magazines - even for people who weren't rock climbers or ski bums or training to climb Everest.

 

[swingline]

The like is for your second paragraph. Great writing in my car garage waiting for the oil change to be done.

 

[SixToe]

Keyes and Hostetter got whacked? Kind of sounds like maybe they didn't want to become conduits on the "read this, use our travel service to book" route. Or they just got whacked to save nickels.

Geez.

 

[BYH 2: Electric Boogaloo]

Thurston also told AMO he plans to take the company public in three to four years.

They're ****ed.

 

[SixToe]

How do you not put Outside on the block, separately, and see if someone buys it?

It's one of the best known general interest (for outdoors) publications. They've done some great work. They're trusted. Reviews are solid and not suck-up blowjobs like "I took this $800 tent to the state park for a night and it's great!" Investigations. Weird ****. Cultural, topical, all the things.

And you just gut it? That's right out of the newspaper playbook. The only thing missing is the "We'll have a leaner, streamlined staff still doing quality journalism and serving the community" bull****, though they came close.

 

[Shropshire Slasher]

This magazine is one of the definite survivors in a tough world. Hate to see this.

 

[WriteThinking]

Outside is one of the best magazines there is -- consistently one of the good things going on in journalism/media these days. There are precious few of those now, and, seemingly, fewer every day.

 

[TigerVols]

How do you not put Outside on the block, separately, and see if someone buys it?

It's one of the best known general interest (for outdoors) publications. They've done some great work. They're trusted. Reviews are solid and not suck-up blowjobs like "I took this $800 tent to the state park for a night and it's great!" Investigations. Weird ****. Cultural, topical, all the things.

And you just gut it? That's right out of the newspaper playbook. The only thing missing is the "We'll have a leaner, streamlined staff still doing quality journalism and serving the community" bull****, though they came close.

They’re doing this because no one wants to consume journalism anymore anywhere; at least not at a level that allows for a profit.

 

[John]

The best of Outside over the years is about as good as any magazine's best. A damn shame what's happened to it. If you ever read Tim Cahill's great stories in there from 20-40 years ago, many of them are in the awesome collections he put out, all with names like Jaguars Ripped My Flesh.

 

[MileHigh]

Agree with the sentiment about Outside. Here's a deeper story about what's going on there.

https://coloradosun.com/2025/02/18/outside-inc-adds-inntopia/

 

[BYH 2: Electric Boogaloo]

Yeah they're ****ed.

 

[Inky_Wretch]

“There is going to be a lot of activity at the intersection of retailers and specialty lifestyle publishing. What is happening at Outside may be the first time many people read about this blending of commerce of media, but it will not be the last.”

I buy ads in specialty lifestyle magazines and websites. It's a damn dirty business. We could introduce a revolutionary new product in our category and those mags wouldn't write a single word about it unless we buy ads. It's all pay for play and has been for many years.

 

[Typist Clerk]

“There is going to be a lot of activity at the intersection of retailers and specialty lifestyle publishing. What is happening at Outside may be the first time many people read about this blending of commerce of media, but it will not be the last.”

I buy ads in specialty lifestyle magazines and websites. It's a damn dirty business. We could introduce a revolutionary new product in our category and those mags wouldn't write a single word about it unless we buy ads. It's all pay for play and has been for many years.

That’s too bad. I quit a part-time job as editor of a regional golf magazine because the publisher didn’t want to include Wilson in a new equipment section. They hadn’t bought an ad in years.

 

[Cosmo]

Our association magazine is basically too small to sell ads to equipment companies, most of our ads are for regional travel. We run an equipment section each issue, just two pages highlighting various items curated by a freelancer who specializes in that space. The only time we've run into the pay-for-play issue was actually on the other end, when we were trying to get a private club in West Virginia to advertise with us. They wouldn't do it unless we guaranteed editorial, and the editorial just wasn't justified. It was a super high-end club that may have appealed to a tiny group of people who could afford it, and not of interest to our general membership. So we turned it down on principle.

 

[Roscablo]

The constantly have editor positions open. I've applied for a few. They usually have insane requirements if they are specific to an activity. There was a yoga one that was open forever and in addition to having the editorial skills you needed to be certified in yoga, have all these hours of yoga experience and it paid not great. It was open forever and I honestly doubt they ever filled it. No way they are finding someone who is essentially a yoga everything including full-time instructor, who also just wants to do a mid editorial job on the side. A lot of their positions are open forever. I have only heard back on one.

 

[Inky_Wretch]

The constantly have editor positions open. I've applied for a few. They usually have insane requirements if they are specific to an activity. There was a yoga one that was open forever and in addition to having the editorial skills you needed to be certified in yoga, have all these hours of yoga experience and it paid not great. It was open forever and I honestly doubt they ever filled it. No way they are finding someone who is essentially a yoga everything including full-time instructor, who also just wants to do a mid editorial job on the side. A lot of their positions are open forever. I have only heard back on one.

I spent 20 years at a newspaper (10 as sports editor) and I couldn't get a callback for a generic copyediting position there about 10 years ago - even though I had an in with one of their writers.

 

[BYH 2: Electric Boogaloo]

Not to threadjack this, but online ads for full-time editorial positions are uniquely depressing and dead-end. More than once, I've seen an ad for a place where I have an in and I've been told those jobs are either never filled or already filled and posted simply to comply with Rooney Rule-esque requirements.

 

[Roscablo]

Not to threadjack this, but online ads for full-time editorial positions are uniquely depressing and dead-end. More than once, I've seen an ad for a place where I have an in and I've been told those jobs are either never filled or already filled and posted simply to comply with Rooney Rule-esque requirements.

I have been looking for a year and have had a whopping three interviews, two with the same place for different positions. I see tons that are reposted all the time -- the Athletic does this, as does Outside for a couple of prominent examples -- or that have been up for months. For the lesser known ones I definitely wonder if they are legit or actually actively hiring.

 

[Inky_Wretch]

Former Outside staffers tell the owner to delete their names from the masthead and nuke their author pages on the web.

Mike Rogge (@skiingrogge) on Threads

 

[SixToe]

Just a terrible situation. The new guy, like others, has dropped a big poo on a respected, strong, trusted publication.