The 'boring' M40 motorway calendar that's a road to success for creators
Designed for 'an audience of like-minded M40 enthusiasts'
A calendar that features a series of photos taken from and of the M40 motorway has become a somewhat surprising international success, with orders coming in from as far away as California in the United States.
The calendar, officially called Landmarks Of The M40 Calendar 2023, is published by Motorway Vistas, a company put together by advertising executives Jim Thornton and Michael Lee, themselves regular M40 commuters.
The publishers describe the calendar as being an ideal Christmas gift for “colleagues, or a long-suffering family member who’s far too familiar with every bend and road sign on the M40.”
And while some may scoff at the idea, the calendar has really taken off. Speaking to the BBC, Thornton admitted that the pair had “slightly struggled” to find 12 interesting photographs that they could use, but that the boring-ness is essentially the whole point.
“On about the fifth journey, I remember saying ‘this is the most boring motorway I have ever been on. There is nothing interesting about this motorway and we should make a calendar of just really boring photos of the M40’.”
Each of the 12 photos is accompanied by ‘fascinating, and frankly indispensable facts about each of the landmarks’
The project started as a way of relieving the sheer tedium of commuting on the M40, which runs through Oxfordshire, Buckinghamshire, Northamptonshire and Warwickshire — all beautiful counties in their own rights, but possibly not best seen from the inside lane of the M40.
Nonetheless, Thornton and Lee started taking photos on their journeys and eventually decided that they had the 12 that would make up the calendar. A highlight for motorsport enthusiasts will by the shot of Prodrive’s HQ near Banbury. Prodrive was founded by David Richards, former boss of Aston Martin and the B.A.R and Benetton F1 teams, and it prepared World Rally Championship title-winning Subarus for Colin McRae, Richard Burns and Petter Solberg.
“Michael, God bless him, took this as a challenge,” Thornton said. “He clearly wasn’t very busy because he then researched various landmarks along it and we discussed ones we should have in.”
While the calendar might be considered something of a joke product, that was not its intention said Angie Allgood, managing director of Motorway Vistas.
“In terms of why we produced the calendar, we had hoped there was an audience of like-minded M40 enthusiasts but were also prepared for the possibility it might just be us,” she told The Times.
“What we hadn’t anticipated was that it would become a story worthy of national media coverage, and now we are getting orders not just from all over the country, including Scotland and Northern Ireland, but also Florida and California.”
According to Motorway Vistas, each of the 12 photos is accompanied by “fascinating, and frankly indispensable facts about each of the landmarks.”
For the record, those landmarks are:
- January: The brown sign for Bekonscot Model Village, Buckinghamshire
- February: The Stokenchurch BT Tower, Buckinghamshire
- March: The overbridge at Christmas Common, Oxfordshire
- April: The Stokenchurch Gap on the border between Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire
- May: The ‘Otmoor Bend’ — literally just a curve in the road near a wildlife park
- June: Middleton Stoney Water Tower, Oxfordshire
- July: The home of Prodrive in Banbury, Oxfordshire
- August: The interchange sign at Umberslade, Warwickshire
- September: The Umberslade Obelisk, Warwickshire
- October: A long run of electricity pylons, known as ‘Pylon Alley’, Oxfordshire
- November: The Viridor Ardley incinerator, Oxfordshire
- December: The ‘Existential graffiti wall’, Buckinghamshire
The calendar costs £7.99 and you can currently buy it direct from Motorway Vistas as a single calendar, or in a two- or three-pack. Assuming, that is, you know anyone who would like a photographic record of 89 miles of tedium for their Christmas present.
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