Mike Steele, the editor-in-chief of Us Weekly for the past two years, has apparently done the impossible: He’s hammered out a new agreement with Jann Wenner to continue running the title for two more years.
And he did it with a few weeks to spare before his contract ran out.
The new deal, signed with a mercurial owner like Wenner, is nothing short of astounding. Said one source, “He was infamous for waiting until the last minute to start contract negotiations and then drag them out for months.”
Take July, 2009. Wenner and Janice Min, who had pushed Us Weekly sales to over 1 million a week on newsstands but had nonetheless seen circulation growth start to slow to just a 1 percent gain, while ad sales struggled (thanks partly to the Great Recession) in the six month period before she left the company.
Wenner had reluctantly been forced to match the nearly $2 million contract that Bonnie Fuller commanded when she jumped ship from Wenner Media, lured away by the promise of riches in the American Media empire of David Pecker.
That didn’t quite work out as well as planned. Fuller jumped ship and Star converted to a glossy, but never quite realized its dream of displacing Us Weekly and battling perennial industry leader People.
Fuller’s split with Wenner was made even more bizarre because both parties had come to a verbal agreement — even going so far as to tell The Post they had a deal.
Then Wenner began squabbling with Fuller over perks, like paying for first-class air fare. Eventually, the fight over the fine print caused the contract to go unsigned.
With that opening, Pecker swooped in and signed Fuller to the lucrative multiyear deal. That set the stage for her then-relatively unknown No. 2, Min, to take the reins.
And it was Min — now editorial director of The Hollywood Reporter — who pushed Us Weekly to its greatest glory in terms of newsstand sales.
But even that was not enough to warrant another big payday.
Sources said in the wake of the Great Recession, Wenner was trying to curtail the package — and that’s when Wenner and Min called it quits in July, 2010.
That set the stage for Steele to step up, first as interim editor and then in October as the editor-in-chief with his own two-year deal. But staff was growing tense in recent weeks as Us Weekly began turning in some of its worst-selling newsstand issues in history — somewhere in the 600,000 or lower bracket — and even Star was said to have beaten it on the newsstand a few times in recent weeks.
But nobody in the celebrity category was doing well.
Said one source, “Newsstand sales for everyone have been abysmal. It’s a bad time for a celebrity magazine editor to be looking for a new contract.”
With Wenner back from his prolonged summer vacation and jumping back into cover selection, some sources thought he was becoming less engaged and putting in fewer hours.
Terms of the new deal could not be learned.
Speculation was rampant that Wenner would have moved to cut the size of the package. But one reliable source said it was for a two-year period, but was not aware of the terms.
Neither Wenner nor Steele returned calls seeking comment.
And of course it could not be learned if this is an actual signed, sealed and delivered contract, or a verbal agreement.
A spokesman for Wenner said, “We don’t comment on personnel matters.”
O’Neil exits
Fuller, now running Hollywood Life.com, the celebrity tracking Web site, has just lost her Los Angeles bureau chief, Lorena O’Neil. In the olden days, her staff of dozens would burn the midnight oil to get out a weekly issue of Us or Star. Now a staff of just over a dozen appears to be burning out.
O’Neil could not be reached, but sources said she just quit and plans to travel in South America. Despite its name, most of Hollywood Life’s edit staff operates out of New York City, where Fuller is based.
Gilt Group
The Gilt Group may soon have some competition in the online luxury retail world now that the European operation, vente-privee, has announced plans to wade into the US marketplace by year-end.
Yesterday, Mike Steib, chief executive officer of vente-privee USA, said he has recruited Hearst Corp. strategic development adviser Robin Domeniconi as part of a management team that plans to launch the online retailer stateside.
Domeniconi was the chief brand officer of Elle at Hachette Filipacchi Media prior to its acquisition by Hearst earlier this year and stayed with Hearst Magazines as an adviser to its president, David Carey.
Domeniconi was among only a small handful of senior level Hachette people to survive the merger.
Vente-privee USA is partnering with American Express in a joint venture.
The company buys high-end brand-name merchandise, from fashion to sports to electronics, and offers it through online “flash sales” to consumers — with the chance to buy merchandise at steep discounts.
In Europe the popular flash sales have pushed revenue for vente-privee close to $1.5 billion annually.
Domeniconi said that the US version of vente-privee is expected tol be live “before the end of the year.” She is going to be the vice president, leading marketing of the US venture. Worldwide, the site counts some 13 million “members” who don’t have to pay a fee to join, but must register online to buy.