Magazine Death Pool

The Grim Reaper corresponds with Business Week over Wall Street woes and publishing

Business Week columnist Jon Fine and I had some recent correspondence about the impact of the Wall Street meltdown on the magazine world. Of course, I had a lot to say about business and personal finance magazines, and it gave me the opportunity to reiterate my prediction for Doubledown Media's ever hastening demise.

I explain the spineless nature of a number of mutual fund companies and other advertisers in the financial sector whose trigger instinct is to run at the first sign of Wall Street gyrations. Instead of assuring everyday investors of buying their product, they get cold feet and pull out or decrease their ads.

For our enlightening letters, dear readers, please go here. Trust me, it's less romantic than "Griffin and Sabine."

Tough day for Wall Street... and Doubledown Media

Well, that's 25,000 potential less readers for Doubledown Media.

ODDS OF SURVIVAL NOW: 15%

The magazine business... it's like lipstick on a pig. A dead one, that is.

You can put lipstick on a pig. It's still a pig. You can wrap up an old fish in a magazine and call it change. But it's still an amphibian wrapped in dead trees.

I will not apologize for that line. This is just a pathetic attempt to play the "magazines are alive" card.

The Reaper is looking at dead magazines walking and the ones with lipstick on the covers have been taking their lumps. I'm not worried about them now. I'm saving them for down the road. I'm looking at some other titles we all know and love which are stagging their way through the early fall and may be knocking on the Reaper's door by Christmas.

You talk political candidates? I talk candidates for that great big recycling center in the sky. Let's check in on our usual suspects...

• POWER & MOTORYACHT, MOTOR BOATING, BOATING: These three have some real problems. While year to year double digit ad decreases is out of whack these days, the boating industry is being smacked two ways, high gas prices and crummy economy. Back in January, the National Marine Manufacturers Association (NMMA) said registrations for new powerboats fell 3 percent in the third quarter of 2007 and 7 percent year-to-date (YTD) through September 2007. One of these titles is going to Davy Jones' Locker in the near future, and trust the Reaper, he won't be singing Daydream Believer.
  
• BLENDER: The September issue, which is supposed to be your big back to school vehicle, was down almost 30% in ad pages. What Kent Brownridge spent the year doing for investors The Quadrangle Group was "not OK," hiring a new publisher from Reader's Digest who doesn't know his iPod from his eyewash. Alpha Digital has put all its digital eggs in the Maxim basket, leaving Blender missing golden opportunities. I don't know how everybody gave Brownridge a free pass after this one.
• RADAR: Earlier this year, founder Maer Roshan said they had enough money to publish one more year, which is probably why they're still carrying the same flimsy amount of ads after reviving itself almost a year and a half ago. The buzz is long dead and gone. They even had the bad luck of hosting a movie screening the same night as Obama's acceptance speech. Now how would Ron Burkle feel about that? It's time for Yusef Jackson to stick with his core competency, selling beer.
• PORTFOLIO: The usual pulse check at Si's and David's folly is feeble. Last September's issue was 122 ad pages, and this year it's, gulp, 45! I've said this many times that when the readers don't stick around or aren't there, the advertisers will desert the ship. This is Cargo redux. When fellow Conde Nast publication Brides magazine gets more buzz than you, it's time to cut your losses.
• KIPLINGERS PERSONAL FINANCE VS. SMARTMONEY: One magazine for the AARP set, the other with the bloom long off its rose. SmartMoney has a super web site with clever widgets and tools that it licenses out. Kiplingers has, well, you can read Knight Kiplinger's defense from back in June here. Maybe his magazine is being propped up by his newsletters, but Kiplingers Personal Finance smells like the US News & World Report of personal finance magazines to me. 
• DOUBLEDOWN MEDIA: Some of my neighbors down here say the financial services industry is not a good place to be these days. Lehman lost half its Wall Street value yesterday. None of this bodes well for Mr. Randall Lane and Mr. Jim Dunning.
• ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY: Like Radar, works best as a web site. Publisher Scott Donaton is not going to be on Folio's "do-ers" list next year, unfortunately.
• TIME VS. NEWSWEEK VS. US NEWS & WORLD REPORT: US News should just fold shop and become the JD Power of colleges. Time's editorial shift is not making them any advertising world friends. One may not be dead by Christmas, but it's not too far off.
• NICKELODEON: I keep bring this one up because it has to go down. Disney closed its kids magazines and Viacom would be smart to put a fork in theirs.

Magazines which will live to see another day:

• MONEY: Can't kill the 800 pound gorilla of personal finance, especially when it's backed up by one of the most visited financial portals on the web.
• FAST COMPANY: Yes, the Reaper is filing this in the "Close, But No Cigar" category. Somebody should give Mansueto Ventures an award for pulling a baby out of the fire with this one-time high flier. Internet start-ups can't help reading about themselves.
• SPORTING NEWS: The biggest "if." They spent a lot of money on launching, marketing and promoting their daily e-mail sports newsletter this past summer, banking on the ads in that making up for their losses in the print title. It's far too early to tell if this strategy is catching on, but the Reaper will be watching.

Letter to the Reaper: Request from FPO Magazine

Dear Grim Reaper,

I was reading Magazine Death Pool this morning, and it spurred me to contact you about our upcoming TIPS issue. 

Here at FPO Magazine, the quarterly publication for magazine creatives, we're working on issue  #4: “Magazines from A to Z,” an issue-length “grazing section.” And we could use your help. Below is a working list of categories we plan to include, and we hope you and your readers will help us fill them. Please post this on your blog so the message gets out to as many people as possible. Every contributor whose tip(s) is published will receive attribution, a link on the FPO website and a “Get Creative” tee (so include your size with your submission!).

Words We Never Want to See Again
Top Ten Typefaces
Top Ten Overused Typefaces
Great Websites
Big Ideas, Small Publishers
Favorite Magazine
New Typefaces
Great Magazine Covers
Grammarcheck (funny faux pas)
Best New (and Old) Books (on writing, editing or design)
Magazine Launches
Other People’s Lists
My Favorite Spreads
Illustrator Spotlight (illustrators you like)
Program Tips (software)
Free Stuff
Type Tips
Design Tips
Editing Tips
Magazine Comebacks
Top 10 Cliché Headlines

Share your tips at www.fpomagazine.com/readertips, or email them directly to me at mckeithen@fpomagazine.com.

Thanks! We look forward to hearing from you!

Nancy

Nancy McKeithen
Associate Editor, FPO Magazine
mckeithen@fpomagazine.com