Business

GETTING NASTY AT CONDé

FOR years, Condé Nast seemed to ride above the fray in the consumer magazine world. But in 2009, that is no longer the case.

The publisher is reeling more than its rivals, as luxury-goods retailers hoard their ad dollars. While the industry is down 24 percent in ad pages so far in the first quarter, many of Condé’s venerable titles are down 30 percent. Start-up mag Portfolio is down a staggering 60 percent, while Wired is off 57 percent.

“They are having the worst year of any publisher,” said one rival executive who once worked at Condé Nast and said the company’s recent cuts of 5 percent each on expenses and staffing isn’t enough.

“They are overstaffed and overpaid. They should have cut back 20 percent when they cut back five,” this person said.

That kind of thinking is stirring fears inside that a new round of cuts could be coming. And for the first time in more than a decade, the privately run company led by Chairman S.I. Newhouse Jr. and CEO Charles Townsend could be awash in red ink.

“We continue to manage our business through a difficult economic climate,” said a Condé spokeswoman.

Much of the problem rests with Condé’s policy of never discounting off the rate card.

“Advertisers are finding that they can buy around them,” said the former executive.

Only one magazine in its stable is showing a rise over a year ago: Golf World, a small circulation weekly, that is up 16.5 percent through the Feb. 23 issue.

Meanwhile, David Carey, a group president at Condé Nast, has been quietly expanding his “group,” adding responsibility for Condé Nast Traveler and The New Yorker.

While Carey’s expanded role is seen as a way to try to impart some of his insight and expertise, it also broadens him beyond the magazines in his group that are struggling. He already had Wired, Portfolio and the golfing titles.

Richard Beckman, arguably the company’s top revenue generator, has pulled his name out of the running to become the new CEO of Parade Publications. He’ll remain the president of the Condé Nast Media Group, which generates about 80 percent of the company’s revenue through the group advertising buys.

In other developments, Wired, which last week lost Chris Mitchell as publisher to the vacant publisher’s post at Condé Nast Traveler, has promoted Associate Publisher Howard Mittman to replace Mitchell.

Venti deal

Jared Kushner, the scion of the Kushner Cos. real-estate empire, is still wheeling and dealing with his New York Observer.

Sources say he is about to ink a deal to distribute his salmon-colored weekly in more than 200 Starbucks outlets across the New York metro area. The Observer is expected to start showing up in early March.

The weekly claims unaudited circulation of around 60,000, but Kushner hopes to sell about 6,000 to 10,000 more copies a week on newsstands.

ODB lives

The former manager of the late Ol’ Dirty Bastard is suing Jamie Lowe, the author of the book “Digging for Dirt: The Life and Death of ODB,” as well as its publisher in a $10 million defamation suit.

Jarred Weisfeld, who was ODB’s co-manager, is suing the Faber + Faber imprint of Farrar, Straus & Giroux, part of Macmillan Publishers, for publishing “false and defamatory” words that damaged his reputation in the entertainment industry.

According to the suit, in one instance, Weisfeld said the author cited a parody of a press conference on YouTube instead of the real press conference.

ODB, who was born Russell Jones, died on Nov. 13, 2004.

The book hit shelves last November.

The suit claims that the author repeatedly used material from the Internet without an attempt to verify its validity.

The book claims that Weisfeld is holding up a posthumous release of ODB’s last album, “A Son Unique,” because of a long-running dispute with the estate.

“That’s just not true,” Weisfeld told Media Ink.

In another example, Weisfeld’s suit claims that ODB was asked, “Who’s your current manager going to be from now on?”

“That’s my man Jarred, and we’re doing our thing, we’re Roc- A-Fella,” ODB responded.

But the suit claims the author mistook the par ody on YouTube as a le gitimate source. In that parody, the question was changed to, “Who’s that grinning, shady- looking white guy be hind you?”

Paul Slevin, an attorney for Macmillan, said to Media Ink, “We have no knowledge that the suit has been filed other than your phone call and we don’t comment on pending litigation.” keith.kelly@nypost.com