Q: Would you consider printing my written piece/ my artwork/ my photo?
A: We’d be delighted to. Fan content is our lifeblood. The submissions address and guidelines are here.
Q: Is the fanzine published monthly or quarterly?
A: We don’t publish to a schedule. Doing the fanzine is a hobby. We do it because we love it so we don’t pressure ourselves to get an issue done by a particular date. We just keep going at a rate that we are happy with and can manage without stress and put it out when it’s ready or good enough.
Q: When is the deadline for submissions for the next issue?
A: There isn’t a deadline. As we don’t publish to a schedule, we don’t have deadlines, either. So there’s no need to rush to get your piece to us for a particular time. Whenever it arrives, we will consider it for the next issue.
Q: Can you let me know the tracking number for the fanzine I ordered?
A: We will always sort out any problems. We don’t send via a tracked service these days. It’s more expensive and, as we sell around a thousand copies, it takes ages to find the number that we’re looking for which makes it almost impossible.
Q: Could you send my fanzine by a different service/ keep it for a while and send it later/ send it to a different address?
A: Each time we put out a fanzine, we get around 50-100 requests to send them by different specified carriers, or to delay sending for a while because the person is on holiday or to send to an address other than the one specified. For as long as we could, we tried to accommodate these, but it just became too much. We’d have to arrange things with three or four different carriers, hold onto lots of magazines in the house until the time came that people wanted us to send them, or hunt through all the address labels that we’d printed to find one that needs the address changing on it. It just got unmanageable and mistakes started to happen. So I hope you understand why we don’t do it anymore.
Q: Can you mark the customs declaration as a gift or understate the value of the item so that I won’t have to pay import fees?
A: Sorry, but it would be against the law to knowingly falsify a customs declaration.
Q: Do you have any back issues available?
A: We have copies of issues eight, nine and ten available. The others are sold out and we have committed to not reprinting, so they are only available second hand.
Q: Are there any jobs going in your office?
A: We don’t have an office and we don’t employ anyone. It’s not a business or anything – just a hobby so it’s just Nick and Andy collecting the content, Helen deigning the cover and Nick and Kath designing the mag. That’s why it takes months or sometimes over a year for us to put an issue together!
Q: I ordered a copy but didn’t get an email notification. Did my order arrive OK?
A: If you’ve received a notification from PayPal, we have your order. We don’t have any “systems” or anything that could automatically send an email when an order comes in so there won’t be an email notification. To be honest, Nick is pretty pleased with himself that he’s managed to embed the PayPal coding into the website so that it can be used for ordering!
Q: Who does what on the fanzine?
A: Nick and Andy collect the content. Helen does the the cover art and Kath and Nick design the fanzine. Nick manages the website and PayPal coding and manages the email list. Nick prepares the text and does any rewrites and corrects and proofreads the content for publication. Nick runs the Facebook page and Andy runs the Instagram account.
Q: I submitted my work to the fanzine for publication. Are you going to use it?
A: Feel free to send us an email and ask us if we are intending to use your work. When we select content for an issue of the fanzine, we don’t routinely contact the author to let them know, I’m afraid. However, we are very happy to respond if you’re wondering what is happening with your piece and we don’t mind at all if you contact lots of times for updates!
David Bowie: Glamour 