The glossy monthly magazines have posted a 4 percent gain in ad pages for 2010, but it’s the weekly magazine, People, which will end up wearing the ad page crown for the entire industry — for the ninth year in a row.
Monthly mags hit shelves in mid-November with their December issues and Media Industry Newsletter showed they rebounded from an abysmal 2009, with a gain of 4.2 percent on the year.
It marks the first time since 2007 that the glossy monthlies have finished with an ad page gain over the previous year. In 2009, the industry slid into a negative 20 percent hole after a 9 percent dive in 2008.
“It’s better,” said Steve Cohn, editor of MIN, “but it’s not a real rebound. At best, it could be described as the start of a very slow recovery. They still have not reached the lofty levels of 2006 or 2007.”
Fast Company was up 27 percent to 541 pages and The Atlantic rose 24 percent to 553 while Food Network Magazine, which started publishing in mid-2009, is up 78.9 percent to 798.
But there are trouble spots. Coastal Living (down 25.6 percent to 449 pages) and Country Living (down 25.5 to 652) are among the shelter titles still reeling.
But there are even bright spots there. Elle Décor was up 34.5 percent on the year to 1,120.9 pages while House Beautiful was up 9.2 to 710.
The weeklies are still closing their last few issues of the year so final 2010 numbers are not in yet, but On the Money is estimating that People will finish with about 3,520 ad pages for the full year, which would be up about 10 percent. It has 3,304 pages and is up 6.9 percent through its Dec. 6 issue.
Among monthly magazines with the same frequency year to date, In Style finished first, up 8.6 percent to 2,512 pages, according to MIN, after losing 16 percent of its ad pages the year before.
Arch-rival Vogue is climbing out from a 31 percent crater in 2009 with a 16 percent rise in ad pages this year to 2,307.
Elle, which recently went into play as part of its Paris-based parent company’s plans to shed most of its print portfolio outside France, finished the year up 9 percent to 2,286 pages while Harper’s Bazaar, ahead 17 percent, managed only a fourth place category finish with 1,791.7 pages, ahead of a sluggish W, down 2 percent to 1,030 after its 40 percent nosedive the year before.
Nobody is exhaling but the industry is expecting a little more vitality in the January 2011 issues, which hopefully will set the stage for a strong March — the true barometer of how willing advertisers are to buy into print.
“There was no place to go but up,” said Cohn. Keith J. Kelly
Shoe in
Ivanka Trump has a spectacular shoe closet — rows of Stuart Weitzman and Jimmy Choo — but these days she’s not taking them to parties.
Trump, 29 is wearing her own namesake line that launches in 300 stores across the US this Friday.
“My time of en dorsing other shoe companies is over,” she said, noting in true Trump style that her designs are “ev erything I love and want to wear.”
The shoe launch is the result of a licensing deal with Marc Fisher Foot wear.
She’s excited about the shoe line, which will fea ture a wide range of 140 styles — including pumps in leopard skin, evening shoes inspired by her jew elry (but with fake dia monds) and even a casual collection with jellies and sneakers priced from $50 to $120. Pumps start at $120.
The shoes will be in Nord strom, Macy’s, Lord & Taylor and all major department stores, as well as online retailers. Julie Earle-Levine
Tie-dye cut
The times they are a-changin’ at Barneys New York, and this time it’s bad news for the hippies.
The swanky luxury chain’s new CEO, Mark Lee, swung the ax last week, and among the casualties was fashion director Julie Gilhart.
In addition to a knack for rooting out fresh talent, Gilhart was known for her “hippy-dippy” sensibility that in recent years has championed environmentally conscious clothing.
Gilhart was a “it’s-her-way-or-the-highway” kind of executive, but Lee isn’t the “warm and fuzzy type,” who was hired in August to make Barneys profitable, according to one source close to the retailer.
“Mark isn’t one to sit cross-legged and eat trail mix and talk about the next designer,” the source added. James Covert
Potty training
If Kraft can’t beat the competition, well it can certainly ask, “Who cut the cheese?”
The word from Kraft’s offices is that the logo of rival cheese maker Sargento is at the bottom of its corporate urinals, according to a source.
The two companies are side-by-side competitors in local dairy aisles. In 2008, Sargento’s revenue was 52 percent of what Kraft’s was.
This year the latest figures put Sargento’s revenue at 92 percent of what Kraft sold, according to Nielsen.
Wonder what Kraft will do with Starbucks coffee beans now that the coffee seller wants to leave Kraft and handle its own grocery store distribution.
Kraft did not return calls for comment. Josh Kosman