The New York Review of Magazines

Vodka

By Georgia Jacobs

ELBOWING through the crowds that flood Barnes & Noble’s mammoth magazine section on the weekends, I was perusing the hundreds of dull covers when bright, cartoon-like flowers and a Japanese rocker girl set against a mulberry background caught my eye. I had reached up and snatched Vodka off the shelf before I noticed the name and then looked around sheepishly to see if anyone had a “look-at-that-lush” expression on his or her face. The short and stout—and somewhat light at only ninety-eight pages— magazine announced its devotion to the clear spirit in big white letters: “Vodka.” Beneath them, smaller ones read: “Urban Living, Cocktails & Culture.”

The cover promised stories on Sweet Yumiko, “a manga artist taking the U.S. by storm;” sexy bar tricks “guaranteed to dazzle;” hot urban destinations; a new life for porn queen Christy Canyon; vodka reviews by Russian chicks and more. It also revealed that this was the publishers’ first issue.

A lavender block on the editor’s page sets a whimsical tone for Vodka’s so-called Signature Cocktail Experience: “1 part urban living, 1 part drinking, 1 part culture, 1 part art, 1 part story-telling.” Co-founders Sean T. Haley, 39, and Erika Kao, 31, are taking the term “cocktail culture” literally with what they think is the perfect recipe for a lifestyle magazine aimed at young urban professionals in West Coast cities. “We chose the name because it intertwines with our readers’ lifestyle—the cocktail culture of downtown social scenes, art openings, blind dates, dinner parties, and cocktail lounges,” said Kao, the “Chief Editor,” in the editor’s letter. “It is cool, sophisticated, smooth and innovative. Vodka is an attitude. It is full of flavor and personality.”

Haley and Kao have set themselves an enormous challenge: creating a unifying voice for more than a handful of cities—it’s not exactly clear which ones—and keeping readers up-todate with a bimonthly magazine. “Our mission is to serve as an exploration guide and conversation piece for those of you who are part of (or want to find out about) the urban social scene,” Kao continued. It’s a promise that could stump even the most veteran publishers, and judging from the awkward phrasing and typo in her editor’s letter—“perhaps try bar trick on someone”—the duo are going to need some expert assistance.

Haley and Kao’s respective backgrounds in marketing and advertising no doubt helped them find a hole in the market. In May 2003, they identified two trends in what Haley called, in a phone interview, the “Left Coast”—the vodka market was booming and 25- to 35-year-old professionals from Vancouver to Portland and San Francisco to San Diego were leaving the suburbs in droves to live in the inner cities.

Although Vodka’s target readers resemble the downtown denizens of New York, Haley said they are different and deserving of their own magazine, adding that when magazines talk about the West Coast they focus on movie stars and car chases. He and Kao want, instead, to focus on giving readers the tools they need to achieve the Vodka lifestyle, promising to deliver articles on loft living, city style and trends, culture and art, nightlife, the urban singles scene, weekend getaways, and, of course, vodka. Indeed, the February/March 2004 issue covers many of these topics, albeit without anything near the editorial finesse of established city publications like Wallpaper* or New York. “Metro Style” is a shopping guide that features unusual products like a chic Deborah Lindquist corset, futuristic fluorescent lighting enveloped by a metallic half-pipe and a playful electronic cocktail book shaped like a flask. The “Art Collector” section is filled with news briefs on art events and exhibitions. Most of them are intriguing, and both sections are nicely designed and written in clean, informative prose.

The same cannot be said for two “feature artist” interviews with video director/photographer Kevin Kerslake and illustration duo Kozyndan. Run-on and incomplete sentences, tense changes, misplaced commas, non sequiturs, mixed modifiers, clichés and an annoying amount of passive voice clog up the prose in these and most of the other interviews. Did I mention shoddy reporting? Not once do Vodka’s writers speak to anyone besides their subjects. It gives the articles a fluffy, promotional feel.

An article on Frank Gehry’s Walt Disney Concert Hall is sophomoric and littered with pat generic statements like these four whoppers in a row: “[Gehry] works close to the edge. He pushes the boundaries beyond previous limits. There are times when he misses the mark, and times when the vision achieved alters everyone else’s vision as well.” Nowhere does writer Craig Stephens back up any of these assertions with examples of what he means by them.

The bar and restaurant reviews found in the “Down with D’Town” section lack perspective in some cases. Writer Katie Shimmer obviously went to the places she covered in Portland, Oregon—she describes the interior in detail and gives good advice on the scene. But other reviews read as though they were written from the establishments’ press releases.

Even so, I want to add that Vodka has its good points. “Sexy Bar Tricks” doubles as a lengthy, professional-looking fashion section and a witty guide to entertaining your drinking companions when clever conversation runs dry. A two-page spread teaching readers to make napkin roses has diagrams and instructions adjacent to an Asian model in a turquoise vinyl sundress lying seductively on a red fur carpet. Strewn about her are turquoise napkin roses. She is smelling one of them alluringly. It’s innovative and fun.

“Russian Chicks’ Vodka Review” has potential, too. Six female reviewers sample various vodkas over a game of five-card draw. The five-page section is interesting to anyone who wants to know more about the more than 500 brands of vodkas that now glut the market. The reviewers’ ratings are neatly packaged with descriptive quips, ingredients and distillations of each brand, as well as martini recipes. While the author, who is one of the reviewers, tries too hard to make herself and her friends appear hip, the concept is original and the artwork fun.

Haley and Kao’s ambitious plan to create a “Left Coast” zeitgeist is partially accomplished through their appropriate choice of interview subjects, topics, and spunky, professional designs and photography. But Vodka lacks a cohesive, authoritative voice that can emerge only through skilled writing and reporting, and, especially, good editing. Startups like Vodka are often short on cash, and with fewer than ten advertisements—almost all of them for vodka—this appears to be hampering Haley and Kao. Hiring professionals is expensive but while the duo have shown their ability when it comes to identifying a niche, at the very least they need to enlist the help of a good editor if they want to attract savvy urban readers—and the advertisers that chase them.