Keith Nelson, Trail's first editor, looks back on 20 years of achievement

Outdoor headlines

14 July 2010 16:02

At the time of Trail’s launch, I was editor of Country Walking magazine. We identified that there was a gap in the market for more adventurous walkers and we knew that the publications currently targeted at this audience were a bit flat. We saw there was a great opportunity for making a more exciting and vibrant magazine; one with a lot of emphasis on fun and enjoyment – serious but reverent, with a good sense of humour. And I already had a range of contacts through Country Walking, so we just began working on both – launching Trail off the back of Country Walking.
 
At first we published it bi-monthly, just to be safe. But a feature called ‘Around the Roof of England’ in our very first issue scored something like 98 out of 100 in research, so after a few bi-monthly issues we realised it was a great success and decided to publish it every four weeks. In our first ABC (an independent report on media performance) we were just behind The Great Outdoors and we’d got to number two in the market.
 
My favourite story from my time at Trail was one about a high walk. We told readers to pitch a tent up somewhere, telling them that they’d have the whole place to themselves. But when they arrived they found about four other tents already there!
 
What I love about Trail is that the ethos from the beginning has been carried on by all of the editors following myself - the ethos that stems from a serious passion for walking and having fun! I am also glad that I fought the publisher at the beginning who wanted to put mountain biking in the magazine; I refused him and insisted that this was a magazine purely for walkers.
 
If you look at the cover of the first issue, you’ll see that it was shot on the top of Snowdon - that young man is actually me, carrying a rucksack full of nothing after getting the train up there (we ran out of time)!