Consumer magazines spent most of the past two decades managing decline. The more confident publishers have stopped doing that. Newsstand sales and print advertising are still shrinking, but well-made titles with loyal readers are raising cover prices and growing.
Scale matters less than it did. Bauer has made Grazia a more premium product and charged more for it, while independents such as Anthem have put print back at the centre of the business and grown their export sales. Stylist has changed format several times without losing its readers. Others have gone the other way, and Gay Times dropped print entirely to build a global audience online.
For most consumer publishers, print is our USP. It’s the anchor that makes advertisers trust us and the very thing that readers want from us.
Jon Bickley Our print strategy: Anthem
Behind the confidence sits some hard arithmetic. Newstrade is now a small share of revenue and events and ecommerce are growing from a low base. Trust has become a selling point as AI fills the web with content of uncertain origin, but the paid-for consumer model that works at scale is still being worked out.
Below you'll find some of our best feature articles on consumer magazines, from premium print and cover pricing to brand extensions, membership and the future of specialist titles, alongside our latest news and industry commentary.
For a while now, magazine publishers have been on the defensive, unsure about the viability of their traditional business model in a fast-changing world. Katie Vanneck-Smith wants to change all that.
We asked Tamar Riley, portfolio managing director at Immediate, what does best practice publishing look like in consumer media? This is what she said…
For premium titles like Grazia, Mojo and Empire, growth is increasingly coming not from extending reach but from deepening engagement with existing passionate audiences, as Lauren Holleyoake tells Ciar Byrne.
The printed magazine will be a cherished part of people’s lives for years to come, says Jon Bickley, co-founder and CEO. That is why it’s the key component in Anthem’s publishing strategy.
With the arrival of AI and the widespread availability of unattributable content, specialist publishers need to ensure that their titles are the trusted go-to brands in their sectors, Our Media’s Andy Marshall tells Ciar Byrne.
Stylist’s mission has been clear from day one: to engage with its female audience in an intelligent, positive and non-exploitative way. 16 years on, and current PPA Media Brand of the Year, they are staying true to those values, says Lisa Smosarski.
Gay Times was stuck in a rut, tied to its traditional publishing model and reaching only a small part of the LGBTQ+ community. Under the editorship of Lewis Corner, that began to change, as he explains to Ciar Byrne.
Whatever the rest of 2024 holds, two things are certain. Firstly, the bumpy economic ride will continue. Secondly, the need for media companies to have a broad base of revenue streams has never been more important or more challenging to achieve.
How do you create a specialist consumer media business that is fit for the future? What steps do you need to take to be resilient and flexible as audiences and technology evolve? Carolyn Morgan researched 20 innovators from across Europe to find out.
For many publishers, circulation is all about chasing volume, but they would be much better off chasing profitability, says Natalie Smith, client relationship manager at Warners.
People spend a lot of time in supermarkets, even during lockdown, and the free magazine racks are an important route to market for many titles. We grab five minutes with SSD’s Andy Barker to talk about trends in this sector.
Independently published magazine The Green Parent celebrates its 100th issue with a brand new look.
Men’s Health has given ‘Generation Covid’ its own platform to talk about the major struggles from the past year, by consulting a wide range of 17–23-year-olds to write, edit and advise its April issue.
Banipal, a magazine of contemporary Arab literature, has partnered with Exact Editions to launch a digital edition of its Spanish-language counterpart, Revista Banipal de literatura árabe moderna.
Forbes has announced the launch of The State of Black Entrepreneurship, an ongoing project that aims to accurately define, rectify and create Black history.
In January 2021, UPM Fine was added to Denmaur’s Carbon Balanced product portfolio.
Clever use of Google’s Flexible Sampling service is a potential game changer for publishers, says Full Fat Things’ Stewart Robinson.
On Monday, Time Out changed its logo purple to mark International Women’s Day.
On 25 February, AllBright, a network for women and careers, announced the acquisition of Australian lifestyle platform ‘The Grace Tales’, founded by ex-Vogue Deputy Editor, Georgie Abay.
Forbes has announced the launch of Forbes EQ (Equity Quotient) on BrandVoice, a thought-leadership platform to drive representation, inclusion and systemic equity.
Media Carrier has increased the current categories to include ‘Multiple Copy Business Sales’ and ‘Free Requested’, helping publishers to extend their reach and boost their circulation figures.
The PPA Awards 2021 will be taking place online for the second year running, on June 23.
Daily Mail and General Trust plc has announced that dmg media, its consumer media business, has acquired New Scientist.
Naviga, a provider of software solutions to publishing companies, has appointed Ben Edwards as sales director.
Computeractive, Dennis’ fortnightly technology magazine, has just published its 600th issue. We grab five minutes with editor Daniel Booth to talk about the past, present and future of the magazine.
