Top Santé Magazine

Reviewed by Dietitian, Juliette Kellow BSc RD

Fact File - Top Santé

Issue reviewed:	June 2005
Pages:	132, 39% Advertising
Circulation:	141,911
Cover Price:	£2.10

Content

A mix of health, diet, fitness, beauty, real life and travel. Plus this issue comes with a free 36-page magazine featuring four new diets to help you get bikini ready.

Overall view

Okay, I’m totally biased. Having recently edited Top Santé, continuing to be their diet expert and editing and writing most of the supplement that comes with this issue, it’s hard for me to find fault with this magazine! But it’s fair to say it’s changed considerably since I left the magazine in September 2003.

In Detail

Top Santé is now a bit like a health version of New Woman magazine. It’s bright, colourful, jam-packed with celebrities and a bit like your best friend. It also manages to be quite tongue-in-cheek, while at the same time imparting useful and expert-led information.

There’s plenty of reader involvement throughout the magazine and this helps to make it feel as though it’s on your side and understands your problems. For example, this issue features three women who lost weight by mistake, reader tips to help you stay slim, readers who are brave enough to undergo a bikini makeover and readers helping to solve your problems.

The magazine starts with a round up of health, fitness, diet and beauty news, followed by experts answering a selection of Q&A’s. The downside to this, is that you don’t hit your first main read until page 36! The features are really well written and include plenty of expert advice. There are also a number of original ideas.

This issue included features on how to stop feeling guilty about being a bad mum, why shopping is the new therapy for many women, how to have better orgasms and a great explanation about all those little itches and twitches we suffer with.

When it comes to weight loss, the free diet book includes four diets, some of which (I admit!) are a bit gimmicky such as the coconut diet and the ‘no carbs for dinner’ diet. The advantage of this is that there’s something for everyone, whether you want a tried and trusted formula such as the GI diet or a more celebrity-led trend such as avoiding carbs in the evening.

There’s also a six-week workout that features both cardiovascular and toning exercises, the latter of which you can do at home.

Who it will suit

Anyone who loves glossy women’s magazines and celebrity gossip, but still wants expert advice on diet, health and fitness.

Juliette's Verdict

Top Santé is inspiring, motivating and packed with original features on health. 9/10