Knowin’ When to Fold ‘Em

More than 40 audited magazines folded during first-half ’07 - a record number, according to Baird Davis. Among the full year’s print casualties: Stuff US edition (1.2 million circulation, folded into a special section in Maxim by new owner Quadrangle Group), Disney Adventures (1.18m), MTV Networks’s Nick, Jr (642,000), Hachette’s Premiere (492,000) and Condé Nast’s Jane (706,000) and 106-year-old House & Garden (976,000).

The previous year saw the demise of Time Inc’s Teen People (1.46m), Emap’s FHM US edition (1.25m), Hachette’s Elle Girl (513,000) and Condé’s two-year-old men’s shopping magazine Cargo (375,000), among others.

While Condé Nast is obviously not alone, its decisions to shut down the venerable H&G last November - and three other brands within the past two years (including Vitals, a shopping magazine published by its Fairchild Publications division for just a year before it was folded in 2005) — have been much-noted because of their context. Meaning, the company’s reputation for making heavy, long-term investments in launches and in revitalising moribund brands that they believe in.

That strategy has, of course, famously paid off over the years (Vanity Fair, the New Yorker). But, to coin a phrase, the times they are a changin’.

By some estimates, Condé Nast had lost close to $100m on H&G since relaunching it in 1996. Logic tells us that one of the world’s savviest publishers doesn’t throw in the towel after making that kind of commitment unless the title’s business environment has changed substantially, and there’s little hope of seeing a more favourable climate return anytime soon.

But let’s not jump to the conclusion that the web is the main culprit behind every folding.

The net may have played some role in H&G’s demise, but an overabundance of print titles in the formerly booming shelter market - now suffering the inevitable consequences of high-risk mortgages - makes some shake-out in this category inevitable.

Title over-saturation is one factor in the shake-out in the teen and children’s magazine categories, as well. And the People print flagship, like its celebrity-realm competitors, has so heavily skewed its content and business strategy to appealing to the younger set that a special, teen-oriented print People edition was probably redundant, web or no web.

This is not to deny that magazines serving demographics like teens, children and young men — segments even more net-addicted than the rest of the population — are taking a harder hit from new media, and have to be very robust to prevail.

And, needless to say, when a print property’s profit margin is no longer cutting it, something’s gotta give. Moving to a net-only brand presence in net-oriented markets — exactly what’s been done with Teen People, Elle Girl and Nick, Jr, for example - makes eminent sense. In fact, although that strategy doesn’t always pan out, these sites seem to be doing fine. At the same time, while it’s not surprising that media-watchers would focus on shut-downs, it’s only reasonable to point out that print magazines continue to be launched. Counting launches is hardly an exact science, but Magazine Publishers of America’s tracking resulted in a count of 262 new titles in 2006 - a 2% increase on ’05.

Further, the past two to three years have seen their share of notable print (cum website) launches, including several from the same big publishers that shut down other titles. Just for example, new titles have included Condé’s Portfolio and Vogue Living and Fairchild’s parenting title, Cookie; Disney’s Wondertime; Rodale’s Men’s Health Living; Martha Stewart’s Blueprint; and Reader’s Digest’s phenomenal Every Day with Rachel Ray.

Also, lest we forget, very few of the most groundbreaking, once-powerful magazines survived the ‘70s and ‘80s, back when "web" still mostly conjured up thoughts of spiders and ducks. Fact is, every magazine has a life cycle, because periodicals were never meant to be literature for the ages. A magazine serves an information / entertainment need until that need is no longer relevant.

Still, the big question - how many / what types of print magazines are likely to be made irrelevant or unviable by the internet - remains.

Newsweeklies of course come to mind. Although they managed not only to survive the advent of television, but thrive, by focusing on news analysis and heavy dollops of entertainment rather than straight news, many think that the internet will spell their doom.

Indeed, in a recent poll of US media buyers by MediaLife Magazine, 65% predicted a coming shake-out in this category, with most of those predicting that the weakest, US News & World Report, would be first to go.

However, 35% said that newsweeklies have sufficient reader and advertiser support to survive the net. My infallible crystal ball is out being polished but, personally, I think Time and Newsweek will hang in there for some years. For one thing, the youngest Baby Boomers may be turning 50, but they’re not dead yet.

The obvious but sometimes unstated reality, for newsweeklies and other general interest, largely ad-driven titles, is that print versions will exist exactly as long as sufficiently advertiser-attractive (albeit declining) rate bases can be profitably maintained. Meanwhile, publishers are of course striving to extend, and perhaps ultimately transfer, the credibility / draw of print-based brands that seem potentially most at risk to online and other new content channels.

Rising print costs will certainly impact decisions, perhaps shortening the transitional or lifespan timetable for some brands.

Even less ad-driven special interest magazines and titles that would seem to benefit most from the visceral, graphical, user-friendly nature of print magazines, have of course been affected by the net’s bottomless well of free information, and some of their publishers may be hard-pressed to absorb cost increases.

Nevertheless, shake-out wise, hysteria seems a tad premature. Again, more titles are still being started than folded. Just as relevant: only 15% of those polled media buyers agreed with MediaLife’s provocative statement: "We’re heading into a period of severe shake-out... Smart publishers are moving to shed the losers before losses pile up." Happy 2008.