How quixotic I was and how informed I sound. Tsk. Fake it, till ya make it. Ha!
Rama Kristian, 30
As the youngest editor-in-chief of one of the largest Chinese luxury & lifestyle magazines in Asia, Rama Kristian, 30, gets our vote for a mover-and shaker. He kick-started the glossy "Sentinel" in a record two months as thousands of copies were directly mailed to the VIP client list of the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China (ICBC).
"The challenge to create a luxury magazine aimed purely at the Chinese market was tough," he says. "But I recognised early on that the business model the publishing house had was brilliant - controlled distribution to the top tier of spenders had a greater potential than launching a new magazine to a market over-saturated with rags in the newsstand. When you can provide exact figures to a brand, as opposed to fictionalized numbers from a semi-plausible survey, you pique the interest of ad-men and admin.”
Despite a language barrier and a senior position at another lifestyle magazine, Kristian was hand-picked to launch and lead the new title for PPA Media Publishing House.
“I wanted in, but with a huge hurdle of not knowing the language (my Mandarin's as good as my Greek. I know the numbers!), not fully understanding the readership, we – and I speak of my bril team – did go into producing the first issue rather blindly.”
As the youngest editor-in-chief of one of the largest Chinese luxury & lifestyle magazines in Asia, Rama Kristian, 30, gets our vote for a mover-and shaker. He kick-started the glossy "Sentinel" in a record two months as thousands of copies were directly mailed to the VIP client list of the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China (ICBC).
"The challenge to create a luxury magazine aimed purely at the Chinese market was tough," he says. "But I recognised early on that the business model the publishing house had was brilliant - controlled distribution to the top tier of spenders had a greater potential than launching a new magazine to a market over-saturated with rags in the newsstand. When you can provide exact figures to a brand, as opposed to fictionalized numbers from a semi-plausible survey, you pique the interest of ad-men and admin.”
Despite a language barrier and a senior position at another lifestyle magazine, Kristian was hand-picked to launch and lead the new title for PPA Media Publishing House.
“I wanted in, but with a huge hurdle of not knowing the language (my Mandarin's as good as my Greek. I know the numbers!), not fully understanding the readership, we – and I speak of my bril team – did go into producing the first issue rather blindly.”
Call it blind ambition but the risk paid off as the monthly publication has created ripples from Beijing to Guanzhou as a go-to reference point. As a directly mailed Mandarin magazine that reaches over 50,000 VIPs in mainland China, this is the fourth title to churn out of Beijing based publishing company PPA, with other titles that are in the works.
“We knew how to create a beautiful looking magazine, we knew how to create content for it,” says Kristian from his office in Sheung Wan, that neighbours Hong Kong’s iconic Man Mo Temple. “I had seen other magazines of the kind and I really didn’t want it to look like an ikea-esque catalogue of brand after brand running the pages, under-whelming the readers. The magazine had to be something people wanted to keep on the coffee-table and not chuck after flipping through it once. There was a lot more stealth in ingratiating product placement within our pages.”
With celebrity interviews, features, a more than generous dose of branding, high-end fashion shoots (“all produced by our team in Hong Kong, we haven’t taken the easy way out of buying content and simply translating them”), it’s indubitably a league ahead of its predecessors.
“I did look at magazines churned out of Conde Nast as a reference, where its about defining a cultural lifestyle as opposed to just style. There’s a huge distinction,” he says.
The magazine is rather thick on designer labels. “Despite my wardrobe, I am brand savvy enough to recognise what would and wouldn’t work for a reader where budget wasn’t much of an issue,” says Kristian. “One of our bosses’ sons was visiting Hong Kong and I took him to a designer boutique, keeping in mind his age and credit-card in mind. Little did I know. After going over jewels as blindingly blingy as they come, he turned around and said to me, ‘I want something even more expensive’. Off to David Yurman and Van Clef we went.”
“Years of dealing with people looking for a discount, a special rate, a mate’s rate… this was a unique experience for me, but it’s a minutiae of what the readers wanted.”
So what is the Chinese luxury market about now? “Where Hong Kong was in the ‘80s. Unshakable loyalty to a recognisable emblem, that’s how I see it. But it’s a transitory phase. It is foolish to assume Chinese buyers will buy anything.”
The long lines outside of Louis Vuitton, Dior, Chanel, in Tsim Sha Tsui say otherwise.
“That’s underestimating a knowledgeable buyer. Sure they’re queuing up, but they know what they want. Without naming names, there was a major designer jewellery brand that tried to haul off all the items that didn’t sell in Europe to China. They opened a pretty shop in a mall and tried to peddle their goods, goods that didn’t even sell well in Dubai. Well, it didn’t work. Miscalculating the buyer was hubris.”
There were initial talks of making the magazine bi-lingual initially but that faded quickly. "Simple fact, Chinese people like to read Chinese magazines. Didn't need a survey to figure that out but I believe from head office (in Beijing) there were inquiries made and it was an overwhelming response.
So what’s it like to be person of influence in a publishing?
“Influential? Me?,” he laughs out very loudly. “Ok, I have no delusions on that aspect. But am definitely privileged, humbled and honoured to be in a position to shed light on things worth shedding light on. That sound lofty enough?”
Just about.
NOTES:
After the horrific time I had with Prive Asia, and the nightmare of dealing with its publisher and self-imposed editor - who was by far the worst person* I've ever met/worked with - Sentinel was a dream gig. I wish I had appreciated it more at the time but we were so busy churning out a mag every four weeks, we didn't take time to smell the ink. Had a good team in the office and we all just got down to work with, no muss, no fuss. Not to toot my own horn - I think the above does that - even I know I was a rockin' editor. If the office hadn't moved to Beijing and the mag hadn't turned to its current incarnation, wonder what life would be like... Oh well.
* how bad was it?! An ex-colleague created "No longer suffering As'th'ma" on FB which has over 100 people! I don't know how that happened considering the team was about 4 people at most - but you must see and hear about the tales. Its shocking how one delusional woman created so much turmoil and damage to so many people's lives. As a lovely friend of mine said recently, "God, don't even think about her. No one else does in the community. She was a nobody wanting to be a somebody!"
Ameen.
