Evo magazine to hit Indian stands in September

The auto magazine will be about the thrill of driving.

UK-based auto magazine Evo is all geared to hit the stands in India at the end of this month. Priced at Rs 100, the magazine will be titled Evo India.

Evo was first launched in the UK in 1998 and has 16 editions worldwide; with the India edition, the number will go up to 17. It will be published in India by Pune-based Golden Sparrow Media, a newly launched publishing house headed by Rohan Pawar. The magazine will be printed in Hyderabad.

Evo India magazine will focus on feature stories instead of news, scoops, road performances and test drives. Its editor, Sirish Chandran, who was the editor for Overdrive till sometime ago, tells afaqs!, "Our stories will make the reader feel that he/she is behind the wheels and celebrate the enjoyment that he gets while driving. People can consume news online. We want our reader to understand how the car/bike does in different terrains."

Evo India will focus on hatchbacks, sports cars, performance cars and exotic cars, along with bikes. It will differentiate itself from other auto magazines by being illustrative, lavish in photographs and features that cover not just the potential of cars/bikes but also journeys, roads suitable for different makes of cars/bikes, food during travel to a region, its culture, unexplored regions and others.

Chandran adds that Evo India will spend more time with the car than other players in the category and aim to be different. The intention is to delight the reader, he adds.

The monthly magazine will have 85 per cent content and 15 per cent advertising. The latter will include auto as well as lifestyle ads. It will cater to people from SEC A and young bike/car enthusiasts. It will be circulated across top 30 cities chosen from the IRS readership patterns for English magazines. The first edition will be launched with 200 pages.

The magazine will face competition from already established brands in India such as Overdrive, Autocar, BBC Top Gear, Auto India and others.

Chandran, who is also looking after the marketing initiatives, is confident that despite a slowdown in the Indian markets, especially with the auto sector, Evo India will do well. "In the near future, we aim to increase our readership base and once the market is strong again, we can look forward to accelerate," says Chandran.

To grab eyeballs and strengthen the subscription base, Evo India has announced a pre launch special subscription offer wherein it has put up 10 seats on the Mercedes-Benz AMG Driving Academy at the Buddh International Circuit for grab.

Some lucky Evo subscribers can also enjoy a full-day high-performance driver training course behind the wheels of cars like the SLS AMG supercar, E63 AMG and C63 AMG, and be instructed by AMG-certified trainers.

It is also offering additional 30 seats to its subscribers to pilot the new ML-Class and GL-Class SUVs on an off-road track at the Mercedes-Benz India plant in Pune, along with a VIP tour of the manufacturing facility.

The print edition will be bolstered by a strong web presence on www.evo.in and social media activations. The Facebook page EvoIndiaMag is already live and so is the Twitter handle EvoIndiaMag. People can subscribe directly through the website or by messaging EVO to 56070. It has also put up 12 billboards in Pune, informing people about the entry of the magazine.

Evo is owned by Dennis Publishing, which publishes 70 magazines such as The Week, Auto Express, PC Pro, Viz and Men's Fitness. It was incorporated in 1974 and has several companies under its banner in the UK and USA.

Golden Sparrow Media Works is a newly launched company under the parent company Golden Sparrow Corporation which also has a construction company and owns a motor rally team.