R.I.P. Skymall

[trailrated]

http://www.wsj.com/articles/in-flight-catalog-skymall-files-for-bankruptcy-1422025308

[iamlindoro]

Article is paywalled... but NOW where am I supposed to get my garden zombies and my name spelled out in pictures of famous landmarks?

[Left]

did anyone actually buy from those magazines?

[Alenzia]

did anyone actually buy from those magazines?

No, but it provided so much entertainment on the flights!

[galliver]

Article is paywalled... but NOW where am I supposed to get my garden zombies and my name spelled out in pictures of famous landmarks?

if you get to it through Google Search it isn't. Silly but true.

did anyone actually buy from those magazines?

No, but it provided so much entertainment on the flights!

Ditto!

[dandarc]

did anyone actually buy from those magazines?

Barney Stinson did.  Of course he is a fictional character.

[Sid Hoffman]

Article is paywalled... but NOW where am I supposed to get my garden zombies and my name spelled out in pictures of famous landmarks?

Yeah thankfully news searching is pretty easy.  Found this:

http://finance.yahoo.com/news/skymall-lands-bankruptcy-flight-shopping-151207159.html;_ylt=AwrSyCTbtcJULmMAC5.TmYlQ

This area here points to a problem:

"With the increased use of electronic devices on planes, fewer people browsed the SkyMall in-flight catalog," Chief Financial Officer Scott Wiley said in court papers. He listed Amazon.com Inc. and EBay Inc. as among competitors with greater resources and more customers. New technology and the cost of getting the magazine on planes "made the traditional in-flight SkyMall catalog increasingly unattractive to the airlines," he said.

I read that to mean that the Skymall magazines were a pain for the airlines to keep on board, especially in light of the fact all the affluent flyers (the ones who can afford to buy Skymall crap to begin with) are also affluent enough to have a tablet or phone to entertain them instead, especially if the flight has WiFi.  Thus the airlines were either demanding more of Skymall for the hassle of keeping planes stocked with the magazines or something along those lines.

It makes sense though: people who are wealthy and like to buy gadgets are probably the prime target for Skymall magazine, but those exact people are the ones who likely have their own phone/tablet and are willing to pay for in-flight WiFi rather than read the Skymall magazine and buy stuff from there.

Pretty much all print media is on its way out as we transition to the paperless world, so with Skymall being so focused on that physical print format, it was kind of inevitable that they'd find themselves unable to compete, since they certainly didn't compete with amazon on price for gadgets, or compete with your local grocery store in terms of supplying necessities.

As for how big the business is:

The business generated $33.7 million of revenue in 2013, according to court filings. In early 2014, the company had tried to remake itself as an online retailer but ran out of cash to pay employees and vendors before it could learn whether the experiment was working.

So $33.7 million in 2013 versus about $75 billion from Amazon in 2013.

[Sid Hoffman]

As an interesting aside, I weighed a couple thin magazines to make an estimate of what I think a Skymall catalog weighs.  My guess is about 6.5 ounces.  That's 0.4 pounds.  Internet searching indicates that 737s like what Southwest uses carry anywhere from 122 to 175 passengers, depending on which exact model of 737 it is.  If we want to round off and just say that the typical domestic plane has 150 seats that seems fair to me.  150 seats * 0.4 pounds = 60 pounds worth of Skymalls.  I can see the weight being a possible motivator as well.  That's like a third of a passenger worth of magazines.

[partgypsy]

Well, at least we still have Hammacher Schlemmer.

[arebelspy]

That's too bad.  I enjoyed flipping through them on flights.

Moreso before I could keep my electronics on though - not to go buy stuff, but just cause I didn't have anything else to do in that 20 minute dark period.  It was good for some laughs and shaking your head at the ridiculousness.

[Frankies Girl]

Article is paywalled... but NOW where am I supposed to get my garden zombies and my name spelled out in pictures of famous landmarks?

http://www.designtoscano.com/product/code/DB383020.do
http://www.grandinroad.com/halloween-haven/

There will always ALWAYS be a way to buy absolutely ridiculous and gimmicky things. Never fear.

Sorry, couldn't resist... :D

(and I always wondered how the hell SkyMall stayed in business especially the last decade when things are so easily ordered on the internet, so guess that answers that question)

[jmusic]

The other thing is that it's impossible to order stuff from Skymall while you're actually looking at it (unless prior to takeoff??), negating even the "instant gratification" factor.

[iamlindoro]

Article is paywalled... but NOW where am I supposed to get my garden zombies and my name spelled out in pictures of famous landmarks?

http://www.designtoscano.com/product/code/DB383020.do
http://www.grandinroad.com/halloween-haven/

There will always ALWAYS be a way to buy absolutely ridiculous and gimmicky things. Never fear.

Sorry, couldn't resist... :D

(and I always wondered how the hell SkyMall stayed in business especially the last decade when things are so easily ordered on the internet, so guess that answers that question)

Whew!  my dream of owning a backyard Sasquatch lives on!

[Janie]

At least there's still Sky Maul http://www.kasperhauser.com/skymaul_site/FlipBook.html "Shop til you drop…from the sky"

[Kris]

That's too bad.  I enjoyed flipping through them on flights.

Moreso before I could keep my electronics on though - not to go buy stuff, but just cause I didn't have anything else to do in that 20 minute dark period.  It was good for some laughs and shaking your head at the ridiculousness.

Good point. The FAA's recent change to allow use of devices during takeoff and landing was probably the nail in the coffin for Skymall.

Yup. I looked at it two weeks ago -- for the first time in forever -- on a trip to Dominican Republic, where they make you shut off your electronic devices for landing.

Did not disappoint, though.

[MsPeacock]

They did have a certain entertainment value - e.g. "Who would buy that????"  I also enjoyed defacing them with my kids - drawing mustaches and such on the models, farts, thought bubbles, etc.

[Davids]

That sucks, I did enjoy looking at all the junk in there on flights. You know what airline commodity will not go out of business, whoever makes barf bags. Unless people stop flying barf bag makers will be in demand.

[JetBlast]

As an interesting aside, I weighed a couple thin magazines to make an estimate of what I think a Skymall catalog weighs.  My guess is about 6.5 ounces.  That's 0.4 pounds.  Internet searching indicates that 737s like what Southwest uses carry anywhere from 122 to 175 passengers, depending on which exact model of 737 it is.  If we want to round off and just say that the typical domestic plane has 150 seats that seems fair to me.  150 seats * 0.4 pounds = 60 pounds worth of Skymalls.  I can see the weight being a possible motivator as well.  That's like a third of a passenger worth of magazines.

The magazine wouldn't have been in the planes if the income to the airlines didn't more than compensate for the cost of moving the extra weight and cost of putting the magazines in the planes. Notice that Delta, American, and US Airways are the largest unsecured creditors in the bankruptcy.