Just when you thought you couldn’t fit any more free sheets into London…

Meet the new monthly glossy freebie that will be circulating in London this month, Amuse. The magazine will be published by Amuse Media, an independent media company based in Covent Garden.

It’s set to be an exciting launch, taking the likes of Stylist and ES Magazine head on. Are we sceptical? Well of course we are. Although the flat plan looked beautiful, this is not an easy place to be. Londoners are at saturation point with the amount of paper being shoved into their hands on their way to work and on their way home. How much more print media can Londoners possibly consume before they, well … explode?

But perhaps I am being overly cynical, British fashion is currently on a high and everyone wants more, more, more. Sasha Slater, former editor of ES Magazine, has taken on the role of editor and Stephanie Hirschmiller, former editor of HarpersBazaar.co.uk, has assumed the role of deputy editor. 

Amuse will offer a mixture of arts and culture, fashion and beauty, shopping and lifestyle, all with a focus on what’s happening right now at the heart of the city.

Overseeing the beauty pages will be Arabella Preston and Bethan Cole, who have been appointed to the roles of beauty editor and beauty columnist respectively.

Other columnists include Sadie Frost and Iris Law, Vogue’s Lauren Cochrane, the restaurateur Rowley Leigh, wine critic Victoria Moore, interior designer Kelly Hoppen, and fashion designers David Koma and Alessandra Rich.

A distribution of 100,000 copies will be handled by uniformed merchandising teams handing the magazine to commuters at 75 central London tube stations, and 20,000 copies will be available for self-selection in a variety of health clubs, spas, city offices and first class airport lounges.

The launch issue will include interviews with Gwyneth Paltrow, Stella McCartney, Norah Jones and Selfridges’ Alannah Weston.
Alongside print, the offering will include digital and social media, as well as an app due to launch in September.

What are the positives? Glossy, and comes out the last Monday of every month to coincide with pay day. London only with good fashion and beauty credentials (if the editors are anything to go by).

Downsides? Do the consumers care? Yes, women love Stylist, are they looking for a monthly fix in addition to their weekly. Time can only tell…

By: Carrie Millard

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The release of the latest figures from the National Readership Survey, for January to December 2011, didn’t come as welcome news to the publishers of some of the UK’s most upmarket women’s glossies.

Harpers Bazaar, Vanity Fair and Tatler all saw marked declines in the readership figures of -14%, -16% and -24% versus the same period in 2010. Worse still, the figures for their ABC1 readers fell even more steeply, by -16%, -18% and -26% respectively. The one shining light was Vogue, which continued to power on in the readership stakes, growing it’s readership by +8% overall and by +4% amongst the ABC1 audience.

These figures are particularly interesting because they contrast with the recently released circulation figures for these titles released by ABC (Audit Bureau of Circulation). These show all 4 titles largely flat or slightly up in terms of circulation year on year.

This may be down to statistical inaccuracy – the NRS figures are based on interviews of 36,000 people, whereas ABCs are a count of every copy distributed. The smaller the circulation, the more likely mistakes will begin to creep into the NRS’s figures. Or it could be that whilst core circulation is remaining strong for these titles, the number of readers per issue is declining as the audience beyond the core active purchasers have less desire to borrow a copy.

It certainly serves to highlight the extent to which different magazines in the sector are passed on. For example, Vogue has a readership of 1.3m, more than 6 times it’s circulation. Compare that to Harpers Bazaar, the number 2 circulating title in the sector, with less than 1.5 readers per edition.

Across the rest of the magazine sector, the NRS figures largely reflect the trends we identified from the recent ABCs. Hence, the lad’s mag sector shows sharp declines – of all Nuts, Zoo, FHM and Loaded are in readership freefall, with readers falling between -20 and -30% between 2010 and 2011. However, the fitness titles, Men’s Health and Men’s Fitness, are both holding up well in terms of readers – this despite showing circulation falls in the latest ABCs. And the more cerebral titles – GQ, Esquire, The Week and The Economist – are either holding their own or powering ahead, particularly the latter 2 titles.

Some sectors of the gossip market seemed to have stemmed the falls too – Closer, OK and Hello only saw single figure %age drops in readers. However others – namely Heat, Now and Reveal – saw double figure %age drops continuing. And the home interest sector was a mixed bag but largely saw readership increases, with a few notable exceptions (an -8% year on year fall for House Beautiful).

We’ve included a full list of results for January to December 2011 below. 

By: Carrie Millard

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Bauer Media is launching a bi-monthly women’s lifestyle magazine this week, LandScape – “Life at nature’s pace” – which will create a new “seasonal category” on the newsstand.

According to the publishers, the magazine’s editorial content will be based around the growing seasons and will celebrate the joy of the garden, simple seasonal kitchen food, traditional British crafts and the wonder of nature and the countryside.

The magazine is aimed at finding an audience among educated women, aged 35 and upwards, with an interest in the countryside and nature. This bears no surprise, especially after IPC’s extensive research on generation ‘Y-Not’. This detailed study confidently stated that women between the ages of 40-60 have incredibly strong buying power and are the main influencers in all household decisions. The research confirmed that women in this target group are not the misperceived (by some), meek and mild housewives, but strong working women in top positions with a rather large disposable income – “Ignore them at your peril”.

Launched on 18 April, it will have a print run of 170,000 and a cover price of £3.90. There will also be a website, landscapemagazine.co.uk.

The most likely competitors for this title will be the likes of Country Living, Jamie (the vanity title published by Jamie Oliver), Coast and, with a little more flattery to LandScape on a numbers level at least, Easy Living and Good Housekeeping.

Bauer has forged two partnerships for the launch, firstly with The Times. A 32-page sampler of LandScape was distributed with copies of the newspaper on Saturday 14 April. Secondly, the magazine is being supported by English Heritage, which will promote the launch issue among its 1m-plus members.

By: Carrie Millard

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