After 17 years at Time Inc., including the last four in the top spot at Southern Living, Editor-in-Chief Lindsay Bierman is leaving for a top post in academia at the University of North Carolina.
The 48-year-old editor on Friday was revealed as the new chancellor of the UNC College of the Arts at the Winston-Salem campus.
Bierman starts the new job in July.
Sid Evans, who has been overseeing Southern Living — along with four other titles as part of his role as a Time Inc. group editor — will be doing double duty as the new editor-in-chief of Southern Living.
Although the magazine does not get the publicity of some of the powerhouse weeklies in the Time Inc. stable, its 2.8 million circulation places it as the No. 8 largest circulation monthly in the US.
Its ad pages were down slightly in 2013, according to Media Industry Newsletter, to 864. It is running 1 percent ahead of a year ago through April, with 285 pages.
The brand has a fierce and loyal following in the South and beyond and was nominated for a National Magazine Award in personal service.
The appeal of Southern Living was among the reasons Meredith Corp. was toying with the idea of a merger with Time Inc. a year ago.
When those talks collapsed, Time Warner made plans to spin off Time Inc. as a new public company and recently unveiled plans to chop 500 jobs companywide.
“I’ve been doing some soul searching and thinking about my second act,” said Bierman, who was on the launch of Coastal Living and became editor of Southern Living in 2010.
“This door opened and I immediately jumped in,” he said.
Evans, who was a past editor of Garden & Gun before landing at Time Inc., said he anticipates no big shake-up.
“I’ve really been immersed in the brand for the past two years working with Lindsay,” Evans said. “It’s a team I know very well. I don’t see any major change in direction.”