The Atlanta media family that controls radio station giant Cumulus Media is near a deal to acquire lifestyle magazine publisher Modern Luxury Media, The Post has learned.
The magazine chain, which sold for $243 million only three years ago, is expected to fetch just north of $20 million in the current fire sale, sources said.
The Dickey family is expected to do the deal through Dickey Publishing, which owns Jezebel Magazine and Atlanta Sports & Fitness Magazine. Lew Dickey Jr. is the CEO of both Cumulus Media and Dickey Publishing.
The Dickeys declined to comment, but sources say the family has emerged as the front-runner in the past few weeks.
Modern Luxury, with city-based mags in 13 national markets, dovetails nicely with Cumulus, which owns or operates about 350 radio stations, observers said. Modern Luxury also does regional brides pubs.
Modern Luxury was put on the block in April by key lenders General Electric Financial Services and New Star Financial, which headed up a syndicate that took over the company last year after it defaulted on $120 million in debt.
The lenders tossed out Modern Luxury founder Michael Kong and installed William Cobert of workout firm EBITDA Media as its CEO in February.
Cobert did not return a call by press time.