Time Out London magazine will mark its first anniversary as a free title with an entirely reader-generated issue.
Readers are being invited to submit reviews based on the theme "I Love London" in what the magazine is billing “The Great Time Out Takeover”.
The title’s editorial team will select a team of reader editors from the best entries. The winners will subsequently be responsible for all Time Out’s content for the issue.
This will include the magazine’s features, interviews, design, photography, the Time Out blog, and even the front cover.
Time Out dropped its cover price on 25 September 2012 after Oakley Capital acquired a 50 per cent stake in the business the previous year. Since dropping its cover price, the publication has enjoyed a surge in circulation to an average of 305,530 per week, up from an average of 52,198 in the first six months of 2012, according to ABC. It is now the most widely read free magazine in London, according to a YouGov SixthSense market report from February this year.
The magazine has also seenan increase in digital traffic. It claims that visits to its website have risen 69 per cent year on year, while its iPhone and iPad apps have been downloaded more than 1m times.
Editor-in-Chief of Time Out London, Tim Arthur, said: “2013 is a special year for Time Ou, not only does it mark the end of our first year as a free magazine, Time Out is now 45 years old.
“From starting life as a one-page pamphlet distributed by our founder Tony Elliott, we’ve grown into a global, multi-platform media brand. We wouldn’t be where we are today without our readers, so it just couldn’t be a celebration without them. There’s no better time to open up the pages of our magazine to Londoners, because we believe that together we make our city amazing.”
The user-generated issue ‘I Love London’ will be available on Tuesday 24 September.
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