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.
Seven has unveiled a new publication to support a joint venture between the world’s largest professional management accountancy body, the Chartered Institute of Management Accountants (CIMA) and its US counterpart, the American Institute of Certified
DC Chess Collection, a new fortnightly partwork from Eaglemoss, goes on sale 8 February, at an initial price of £2.99.
The Vogue Festival 2012, in association with Vertu, is being launched in London this year, it was announced yesterday.
Glamour magazine and an accompanying website will launch in Brazil in March 2012, it was announced yesterday by Jonathan Newhouse, Chairman of Condé Nast International.
Future Publishing has published the dates for its 2012 Adrian Flux Auto Event Series.
Virgin Media is this month launching its new customer magazine, working with Redwood, a leading strategic content agency.
Little Cooks Collection, a new fortnightly partwork from Eaglemoss, goes on sale 1 February, initially priced at 99p.
As publishers, we are not short of data. The problem many of us have is that much of it has been collected without enough thought being given to the questions or the structure, resulting in messy, hard-to-use data. Chris Matthews has some data collec
Chief Executive of Cambridge University Press, Stephen Bourne, has announced that he is stepping down from his post at the end of April 2012.
Bauer Media, publishers of Heat, Grazia and FHM is terminating its contract with Media Sales Network (MSN), the independent advertising sales house that currently handles regional advertising sales across its portfolio.
Immediate Media Co is making available for syndication an unprecedented archive of Gordon Ramsay recipes from its food portfolio, including olive and Good Food magazines.
David Hepworth’s regular column, in the January / February 2012 issue of InPublishing magazine.
As the New Year commences, Karlene Lukovitz offers a US-centric look at some key issues, trends and priorities on the overflowing plates of consumer magazine-based media companies.
Times are challenging. No one needs to be told that, but, writes Jim Bilton, the latest wave of the Publishing Futures project provides a lot more shape and detail to that bald statement.
Facing global economic meltdown and the inevitable impact that will have on their clients’ budgets, what does an advertising director do? Panic? In IPC’s case, he restructures his commercial teams, beefs up his creative services department and gets a
