How To Pitch Stories To The Autopian So You Can Get Published On The Ultimate Car *Cult*ure Website

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There’s a chance you read the stories on The Autopian every day and think: “Look at these absolute goons; if they can do this, so can I!” Well, yes and no. After all, “can” and “should” are very different things. We must advise caution here; do this wrong, and you could go down a very dark path that ultimately leads to Buick Park Avenue Ultra ownership. Having said that, we’re always wanting for stories around here, especially from new voices and especially if those voices can meet our tough editorial standards. We pay, too!

So if you want to pitch a freelance story to us, go ahead (and thank you for considering writing for us). But here’s what we’re looking for, and what you need to do first.

Some Basics

Learn Aps

Our Mission: The Autopian’s goal is to serve the car enthusiast community by sharing stories that inform and entertain while celebrating the unifying quality of automobiles.

Our Philosophy: The Autopian is a “Yes First” organization. New ideas are welcomed with open arms, not discarded out of fear or laziness. This team embraces change and growth.

Quality Is Job Number One: Basically, be prepared to turn in good, clean, high-quality writing. Read Strunk & White cover-to-cover. Consult the AP Stylebook. Make sure 100% of your stories have gone through a spelling/grammar check (Google Docs will do) prior to submission. This last one is a requirement—since we’re a small operation, we’re not in a great spot to perform surgery on your work.

What We’re After: The Double-E Rule

Double E

We Value Expertise: What can you teach readers that they don’t already know and cannot easily learn without your guidance? What insight do you have — through your own experience or through your research?

The “Double-E Rule”: Any article written on The Autopian must meet the following criteria: It must be entertaining or sufficiently enlightening. Ideally both.

For readers to feel that their time has been well-spent perusing an article, they must have experienced either fun or significant learning. In other words, the typical reader expects each story to contain humor, some other form of entertainment, or a significant amount of information that they don’t already know.

If a person finishes a story and does not say either “Wow, that was fun” or “Wow, I learned something new today,” then they will likely be unsatisfied with the piece.

Thus, the Double-E Rule is the standard at The Autopian. Building an understanding of how much of each E is needed to leave your audience satisfied is something that takes time and experience. Until then, just ask yourself “Is this entertaining or enlightening?” And if it’s not strong in one area, is that made up for with more of the other ingredient? Just posing that question can expedite your ability to properly frame and execute your story; fine-tuning the quantities will come with time.

Note: This isn’t just about making readers happy that they took the time to read your story, it’s about getting them to read the story in the first place. The latter is just as important as the former, and the Double-E rule applies to it just as much. Your headline and intro paragraphs need to help readers feel like they’re either going to read something fun or that they’re about to learn something new (and that they haven’t read elsewhere.)

As you establish your reputation at the site, people will associate your byline with Double-E, and that alone will be enough to get them to read; that should be the dream of any writer.

If you’re not a seasoned expert, you need to figure out why anyone should listen to you. Or you need to find people who are and interview them.

Not An Expert? Find One

If you write for us, you’re a journalist, and that means we have high standards for accuracy and quality.

It’s your job to leverage that opportunity to provide readers with genuine insight. Get answers from experts, not just some website that you Googled. Dig into exclusive imagery and long research papers, not just YouTube videos. Make some phone calls, send some emails, or experience something in person: You are the public’s tour guide for the automotive industry. And if properly executed, that tour will fascinate hundreds of thousands of people every day.

Technical Articles MUST Include Input From Experts

At The Autopian, we generally expect stories to include input from experts (engineers, technicians, historians, analysts, etc.) whenever possible.

If you are one of those, great! We’d love to have you write for us. If you’re not, find some experts—or ask us to hook you up. We have an extensive Rolodex, we don’t expect you to know everyone and we’re always down to help.

Example: If you want to write a story about bushings — ex: “Bushings Can Make A Huge Difference In How Your Car Drives: What You Need To Know” — our readers will expect that story to have input from people who are experts on the topic. Engineers, mechanics, product planners, America’s top scientists… people like that.

In this instance, if you’re not an expert, you cannot write authoritatively about bushings (again, just an example) without strong sourcing. Even if you’ve done all sorts of research on the web, you’re going to miss certain key elements that only an engineer can know, so you need to make sure your research includes input from true experts. Yes, you can base your story on a scientific research paper written by experts, but your first instinct should be to have experts directly inform our stories, especially technical ones.

If you need some, just ask! We’re probably able to help you find some folks if you need. But that’s something you should try to bring to the table.

Images are Critical

All stories here have art of some kind. You don’t have to be a pro shooter, but it’s highly encouraged to bring your own work, or use photos from the automakers’ media sites or publicly-available pictures.

Snag screenshots off YouTube, Wikipedia is sometimes okay if it’s labeled public domain, use for-sale listings, and of course, manufacturers’ websites are often awesome. If you’re not sure whether you can use an image, just ask (we have a guide). If you need The Autopian to draw you an image, we have artists on our payroll.

What We Want

  • Engineering deep-dives into interesting, relevant technology, especially written by experts in their fields.
  • History lessons from people who were there at the time.
  • Dives into an interesting car culture or subculture nobody knows about.
  • Deeply sourced stories where a lot of voices are involved.
  • Stories from people who lead interesting lives working on lots of interesting machines.
  • Stories that counter a popular narrative, and are different from everything else on the web.
  • Stories from folks who who maybe haven’t been represented much in car journalism, for whatever reason.
  • Stories with lots of good, original photos whenever possible.

What We Don’t Want

  • Car reviews if you’ve never done any before, or requests to get into a press car.
  • Articles that require a lot of overhauling. We keep our overhauling to cars!
  • “Takes” that do not require significant research/a unique perspective. (Ex: “I think this car is the best value on the market” — This does not pass Double E).
  • News items—we have a daily staff that handles those. (Unless you’re sitting on a hot scoop, in which case, get in touch ASAP.)
  • Very short items. No thanks, we want features instead. (1,000 words is considered on the smaller side)
  • SEO-gaming articles and lists. Leave that race to the bottom stuff to the competition.
  • Fiction or satire (only Jason gets to do this). We are not a literary magazine.
  • Press releases or PR pitches (unless you’re with an OEM). Please don’t send those to the contributor story pitch line.

Ok, with that out of the way, here’s what’s next:

The Process

Step 0: You can request a more complete freelance pitch guide via email (pitches@theautopian.com. Use subject line: Pitch Document Request).

Step 1: First, freelancers suggest a topic to write about with a specific angle involved. In the business, we call this “the pitch.”  Often this can be in headline format (How Volvo’s Radically ‘Humane’ Car Production Idea Lost Out To Toyota, for example.) It can be a rough headline idea; your editors will make the final call on the headline.

Make a list of story headlines that will form the basis for the stories you’re pitching. Along with each headline, include a 1-2 sentence blurb about the story’s subject and angle. Also include why each pitch passes Double-E.

Step 2: Send it to us at pitches at the autopian dot com. Twitter DMs and text messages don’t count as pitches, sorry. If we’re interested, you’ll hear from us. If we’re not, you may not. Don’t take it personally—we’re a small and busy team and we do the best we can. [Ed Note: This guide is hopefully going to help us improve our process, as I haven’t been great about freelance-submission management. -DT].

But if we’re into your idea, then you and the editor will concoct a basic plan of how to construct the story. A deadline will be established unless it’s a piece you’ve pre-written first.

Step 3: Upon receiving the draft (in Google Docs, with grammar/spelling check already complete), the Autopian staffer will go back and forth with the writer, suggesting edits until the piece is ready for publication.

Step 4: Upon handing in the final draft, email a completed W-9 form and an invoice to david@autopian.com (a standard invoice doc is available should you need one). Just make sure to include an invoice number of some kind.

Freelance Story Rates

Our freelance rates are based upon a number of factors, the main ones being 1. The author’s level of expertise on the topic 2. The author’s writing experience. 3. How well we think the story will perform with our audience. 4. If travel is involved or heavy research, those can affect the rate, as well.

Generally, though, we start at $300 for “standard” stories from people with professional writing experience, and move up to $500 for longer, more heavily researched/reported features or for reviews that require multi-day press trips. Though we are a startup trying to remain lean, we’re willing negotiate up for excellent stories, especially pieces requiring extremely intensive research. (If you have a world-beating piece, we want it to be published here). Newbies with no writing experience who have interesting stories to tell will also sometimes be accepted, as well, though we pay about $100 to $200 when the story is from someone new to this world and when it requires major surgery (this number can grow as the writer grows).

Any Questions?

Hit us up anytime! Email david@theautopian.com.

And readers, we’d love comments on what types of stories you’d like to see around here. Maybe a freelance writer will see your idea with its many thumbs ups and think “Hmm, maybe I should dig into that.”

About the Author

Lewin Day

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148 thoughts on “How To Pitch Stories To The Autopian So You Can Get Published On The Ultimate Car *Cult*ure Website”

    1. So I’ve been told, both “autopian.com” and “theautopian.com” should work when emailing most of us. It doesn’t seem to work with my email address, but it does with David and Jason. 🙂

      Edit: And that little problem has been fixed! Indeed, feel free to message us using either address.

  2. I wrote a lengthy technical report about the study of traffic flow on a major Toronto highway that I used to cap off my Civil Engineering education! Any takers? No?

    1. It depends, did it uncovers any shocking truths or unexpected results?

      • Beaver migratory patterns have affected this major Canadian highway. Here’s how
      • A Canadian study found that properly calibrated traffic light timing lowered cholesterol
      • Does tailgating with your brights on actually get you to your destination faster?

  5. “And readers, we’d love comments on what types of stories you’d like to see around here.”
    More than a few of you have mentioned you would like to see a series from me digging into some classic (and not so classic designs), what’s the consensus from the great unwashed hoi polloi esteemed commentariat?

    1. I’ve never read any review of yours that wasn’t both entertaining and taught me something new about how to look at cars, and I look at cars a lot.

      I think we need to hear about beloved classics that you think are wrong, and maybe some uggos that were a few reworks from success.

    3. Yes please! We can all see for ourselves what makes a pleasing or not pleasing design, but to hear the explanation of why it’s so takes my appreciation to a whole new level. I’d be especially interested in the gray (er, grey) area of stuff that generates controversy within the professional community.

    5. 100% yes! I love your articles about design on Hagerty. Some articles about holy grail cars like e-types, or Ferraris and give us the why or why not. And you like goth rock, so we’re cool.

    7. Flipping do it or I will come paint your car white.

      Suggestion: a comparo showing how Geiger was a genius and his protege Sacco was not very good.

  6. “Images are Critical”

    Will we ever get to post the images in the comment section? It is irritatingly tiresome to search for the exact image with link to post here. Not everyone has Flickr account to post the photos and link them. Some of the links, especially older ones, no longer work or don’t appear in the Wayback Machine.

    Thanks…

    1. Nop nop nop, very few people have control and taste about what they post. Allow image and gif to be posted and this will end up like any facebook of instagram comment section, something disgusting to look at.

      1. Comparing The Autopian to Facebook and Instagram is stooping pretty low. Do you have to do that? The former has a different and more specific audience than the latter two. So, tossing both in the same pile is totally wrong…

        Curbside Classic has allowed the commentators to post the images for a long time. I have yet to come across any offending images there. Same with the website-whose-name-shall-not-be-mentioned-here-that-starts-with-J.

        To conclude, your argument is very much moot.

    2. We’d love to add image uploads to the comments. Our concern, for now, is the risk that someone will abuse the privilege and upload something illegal or worse. At least with links, you don’t see the image and have to click on the link to go off-site. Maybe/hopefully in the future!

      2. Take if from me that used to manage a software user forum for “professionals”, do not, under any circumstances, allow photo upload if you value your time.

        1. And ours… I can already see the comment section spammed with gif, or full picture listing of car collection as a signature at the end of every boomer comment…. (Like on all forums)
          Damn i hope not.
          I’m glad Mr viking think this place would end up different, but no, just would become unreadable and divise the crowd of readers, reduce engagement to the boomers using pictures, and few people with too much patience.

  7. “We reserve the right to be mean to you if you do.”
    Nah, I refuse to believe it. You guys are nice to the core. Keeping a bag of nasty to use just once in a while takes too much space and energy that you could devote to rescue cats, weird kei cars, buses and RV, suicidal shit ox rescues etc…

  8. Okay, so, do you or do you not want to hear the collaborative pitch from me and Jack Trade about our fictional series set in California featuring Donny Most and the secret gang of police ninjas?

  9. Guys this is a great idea!
    It’s not for the likes of me -he who has a supernatural ability to make words confusing- but i’m sure there are some potentially awesome writers out there

  10. Oh good. This is useful. I’ll likely do one or two in time.

    The first is doing what the manufacturer wouldn’t homologate themselves, even though the prototype had it, the demand was obviously there, and people are now crying that this one holy grail option wasn’t offered. Yet given the OEM parts bin, I’ll do it even better.

    The other an OEM-grade conversion. The manufacturer only sold 75 OGs in the US, and one renowned journalist debated selling his entire car collection to get one of them.

    Give me a few years. There’s insane levels of building requirements, finding the wizards to do OEM or motorsport-grade quality, and ensuring they’ll be 50-state legal.

    1. Apparently if you’ve read lots of Autopian and Jalopnik from the good days, some of the writing quality and humour infiltrates your brain deep enough that you don’t need to read the AP style book. Your mileage may vary.

          1. Not necessarily. There’s a lot of AP Style tips/explainers available online. The book is mostly a handy reference for “How do I format this abbreviation?” or “What’s the standard term for [thing]?” and the like.

            It’s also the reason I typed “Web site” (two words, “w” capitalized) for far too long after the internet determined that this was one uncapitalized word, so YMMV, and the site’s final edit presumably gets the last word.

            Nearly every publication has their own style guide on where they deviate from a given overarching style anyway (like jumping to “website” before the AP Stylebook got the hint). The New Yorker’s use of a diaresis—which looks like an umlaut—over consecutive but different-syllable vowels is a good example. “Coördinate,” for example. Don’t do that, though. New Yorker articles are the only time I see that in use, but it’s just one of the more obvious examples of a publication deviating from the industry norm.

              1. She’s had at least one here, I was jumping up and down when I saw it as she’s always been one of my favorite automotive authors, and I was really hoping it would be a regular thing, but it hasn’t been unfortunately.

            3. Doesn’t the NYTimes also do the diaeresis?

              I wonder if Word, Google Docs and the like can apply whatever style guide to your documents automatically.

              1. IDK on both accounts. I don’t think I’ve seen that in the NYT, though.

                Anyway, GDocs are great for catching the basics, but I usually edit by the seat of my pants. (Knowledge pants.)

                I know there are some headline capitalization bots out there that will put your headline into AP and other formats, so I don’t see why someone wouldn’t create an auto-check for popular stylebooks in longer works.

            4. I’m a diehard Chicago manual of style guy, mostly b/c of its ethos of focusing on communication, not rules – what communicates the writer’s intent/meaning/tone most clearly is what’s correct.

              1. Thank you for the ready made excuse friend. “I’m not lazy, the spelling mistakes are part of the tone I aim for, and as a Chicago manual of style man I say that trumps your ‘AP style book’ or ‘dictionnary'”

                1. Or in my case, ‘ideas of coherent thought.’ 😉

                  I enjoy its pragmatic relativism, though in fairness, it is like 4x as thick with rules as Strunk & White; it’s just willing to bend them for sake of clear communication.

                  For instance, I love how it handles split infinitives…while “not to do X” may be correct, “to not do X” can sound less clunky and by moving the not closer to the thing that you’re not doing, the meaning is emphasized.

                  1. S&W is trash. It has popularized and turned into edicts about grammar what are merely style preferences grounded in precisely nothing.

              2. There’s a few bits like that in AP that I’m okay with—Oxford commas being okay if needed for clarity, for example. (That’s another one frequently overriden by Oxford-comma-loving sicko editors.)

  13. { sees no rules against Puffalumps }

    IN THIS ARTICLE, I WILL DISCUSS THE MANY KNOWN VARIATIONS OF 1987 FISHER-PRICE PUFFALUMP EASTER BUNNIES BY THEIR CORRELATION TO SPECIFIC PORSCHE OPTIONS AND TRIMS.

    (Yeah, yeah, please whitelist my silly freelance email.)

  14. Strunk and White? That’s a Ford dealership in some tiny little farm town that started up in the early 1910s, right? I thought they’d closed down in 2010 or thereabouts.

      1. It has a significant fan base in Brazil, and also several detractors. I may consider try a piece on this car and Brazilian car culture.

        1. I’d love to hear about that. I learned a ton in the Donut episode about Brazil, and I’m hardly a Donut fan. The things those caras do with a VW engine are locas!

        2. Muito Bom! I would greatly enjoy more Brazilian car content. My wife is from Rio and we only make it back to see her family every few years or so, but I always find the automotive landscape there endlessly fascinating.

  17. Thank god you didn’t say anything about manifestos! I have 78-82 Microsoft Word pages of options on/or adjacent to station wagons, and you’re going to read about them!

    1. I would actually love this – a rotating piece were readers get on their virtual soapbox and harangue us with their vehicular contentions, the more outré the better.

      Like there’s gotta be someone who’s passionate about crossovers or CVTs and I’m open to hearing their (misguided) arguments.

        2. My first exposure to a CVT was in a 2-stroke Polaris Scrambler ATV. That thing would rev up to the very peak of its powerband and JUST KEEP ACCELERATING! The way most automotive CVTs try to emulate a geared automatic just seems silly to me.

          1. I hate fake gears! The Lancer doesn’t do that and I love that about it. It feels way easier to me to just nail the throttle and control the revs with the pedal position than it does to drive a standard automatic (or worse, a CVT faking “gears”).

      3. Call it Pitchforks From the Plebeians. Then let those who are uniquely passionate over a niche subject present their argument in the court of public opinion! If you present some James Beard award level hot takes, I’d read it.

      4. I don’t know whether “passionate about CVTs” is quite right but somehow I’ve ended up with a 1975 and 1976 Volvo 66 GL, a 1978 and 1980 KV Mini 1, and a 1981 HMV Freeway, all with CVTs. In each case I consider the vehicle’s transmission to be a big part of its charm. I have no experience with the newer stuff, though, so you’re on your own there.

        1. Your posts immediately came to mind. And Toecutter’s rants about aerodynamics. Passionate, even angry, but always well-reasoned and presented.

          I enjoy how people here can be quite charged about things and ideas, but never people. The discussions rarely become personally antagonistic and the level discourse is in its own way quite philosophical in that it’s about seeking the truth, not winning an argument. Rare in the world, even more so on the internet.

          1. I really would contribute to something like your idea, and as always I would welcome argument, contention, disagreement, etc as it’s often how I learn the most.

            The idea of me writing a formal article and submitting tax docs and invoices for $100 is a little ridiculous, if I’m being honest. But the diversity in opinions and knowledge of the readership are something it would be awesome to highlight more. And god knows I have plenty to say. I’m sure others do too.

    3. This actually may be a brilliant idea. Harangue us about why an AMC Matador is the ideal overlanding vehicle. You may not succeed in persuading us, but I can imagine that could be a great read.

      *intended to be in reply to Jack Trade below*

  18. Well I’d pay to read RootWyrm rant about Chrysler product minutiae for pages on end. Oh wait, we already get that for free…I do kinda worry you’re going to paywall him at some point.

  19. I really like that this site is reaching out to the readers to participate and add their input.

    I plan to eventually participate by writing some articles. A deep dive of each my vehicle builds is on the list of things to do once they are in a condition that I’d feel confident letting Torch drive them(whether or not he does would be another issue altogether, but that would be really cool to see). Lots of math will be involved in any deep dives I do.

    I also have plenty of “hot takes”, with a variety of sources to substantiate them.

    2. Send me cad files or drawings of your micro car some day and we can collab on a homebrew CFD analysis of the body. That’d be a cool article!

  20. Please don’t take this the wrong way, but one thing I think the site needs is a proofreader. The quality of the double-e articles have been most enjoyable, however I do see repeated or left out words at times, among other things. Still enjoy the work, but it does detract.

  21. I have an idea and put in for a pitch document.

    I see this as a great way for the readers to contribute to the hive mind.

    Will part of our pay be in feral kittens?

  22. I’ve been curious about all of this of years. Thanks, I had NO idea what these rates were. I thought the numbers had an extra zero on them, honestly. Thanks for sharing this and being so open.

  25. Thank you very much for this! It’s good food for thought.

    Either you read my mind or you’ve been fielding the how-to-pitch question a lot lately. 🙂

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