'Cargo' Is Dead, Day 3: Time to Reflect, Look Ahead
Always a clutch player, the Observer comes through today with some winning coverage of the demise of Condé Nast's Cargo. While we don't learn too much more than what we already knew (denials that it had anything to do with Men's Vogue; Condé cockteased secured a loan for EIC Ariel Foxman to buy an apartment just last spring), there's some telling quotage from Foxman just hours after he was thrown out of his home.
"It was never a men's shopping magazine," Mr. Foxman said. (Each issue included a sheet of page-marking stickers reading "BUY" or "SAVE.") "It was a magazine that helped guys figure out the things they would need." (September 2005: "These jeans reverse from a dark blue rinse on one side to a light gray-blue on the other.") "It never identified with metrosexuals." (November 2005: "I would love to find a cleaner, less painful depilation process — and maybe sugaring will do the trick.")
Riiight. And for all those Cargo subscription-holders who will be put on the GQ mailing list? What ever will become of those not-metrosexuals?
"We'll work hard to earn the loyalty of those new readers, and hopefully we'll be able to give them something of what they looked for and came to respect in Cargo," [GQ editor Jim Nelson] said.
The March edition of GQ features an item urging men to consider wearing "subtle pleats on slim cut-pants" such as a $425 pair from Miu Miu. Another page instructs readers "How to Pull Off Workwear (Without Looking Like a Tool)": "If you buy one of Carhartt's iconic zip-front jackets, get it a size smaller than you normally would — it'll be trim and snug, the way you want it."
You know? We think those displaced Cargo fans are going to be just fine.
