Bauer to Launch Good Housekeeping Rival?
The recently released ABC circulation figures for January to June 2010 show that women’s magazine readership remained stable vs. July to December 2009, with most titles posting either static circulations or small declines. However, there were some notable winners and losers.
For example, although Glamour remained on top of the women’s market, with a slight increase in circulation on the previous 6 months (2.1%), its competitors, Cosmopolitan and Company, both suffered sharp declines of 6.6% and 9.5% respectively.
Other big losers in the monthlies market included Psychologies (-9%), and She (-3.9%), whilst in the weeklies market the freefall in the circulation of the ‘gossip’ magazines continued with Heat’s circulation falling 9.1%, Now’s down 14.2% and OK!’s plunging 18.6%. Although it would be tempting to herald the end of ‘celebrity gossip’ culture, the truth is this audience is heading online to destinations such as the Mail Online.
In contrast, titles such as Harpers Bazaar, Stylist and InStyle managed to post notable increases in circulation.
Harpers Bazaar succeeded in growing its circulation by 7.2% on the previous 6 months, consolidating its position in 2nd place in the ‘high end fashion’ market, ahead of Tatler but still well behind market leader Vogue. The gap between the 2 leading titles narrowed to below 100,000 copies, but with ‘bulks’ making up 25% of Harpers Bazaar’s circulation compared to less than 5% of Vogue’s, there is still a considerable gap to narrow before the NatMag’s title can be considered a genuine rival.
Stylist continued its meteoric rise with a 2.6% increase in circulation to just over 420,000 copies. The circulation of weekly rivals such as Look and Grazia remained largely static.
The rise in InStyle’s circulation of 1.6% to 186,000 copies was good news for new editor Eilidh MacAskil. However, whether editorial was at the heart of this rise remains open to question as the title ran cover mounts offering gifts and discounts for 3 titles in the period and was multi bagged with Marie Claire for 4 out of the 6 issues in the period for at least part of the circulation (ranging between 8% and 18%.)
One sector of the women’s market that did remain buoyant is the older end, represented by titles such as Woman & Home and Good Housekeeping. These magazines posted year on year circulation increases of 5.5% and 3% respectively. If rumours that Bauer Media, publishers of Grazia, are planning to launch an ‘upmarket Good Housekeeping’ are true, it’s looking like a shrewd move.
Women's Magazines ABCs January to June 2010
