Overview of magazine industry

Overview of magazine industry

More than 8000 titles published in Britain, they can be categorised:

1.       Consumer (general and specialist) these can be sold in newsagents and are also available online.

2.       Business/trade/professional- these are suitable for people at work.

3.       Customer magazines that organisations can give to their customers to advertise.

4.       Staff magazines to inform the workers about the company which they work for.

5.        Newspaper supplements- these come free when a daily or Sunday paper is purchased.

6.       Part works- issues build into an ‘encyclopaedia’ of a specific topic.

7.       Journal with aspects of education- for university students

Out of all these magazines Consumer magazines seem to make up the bulk for titles sales in newsagents. These can be general titles which aim to inform but mainly entertain (such as ‘Elle’, ‘Radio Times’). These types of magazines tend to include gossip and information into celebrities around the world, but can also be sophisticated including fashion and art attracting a female target audience. This bulk of magazines also contain consumer specialist titles which can be aimed and a certain sport/hobby (such as ‘Car’, ‘Total film’).

The biggest consumer magazine (in 2008 newsagents) is Bauer Publishing with 25% of the industry this is closely followed by IPC Media with 20% and although BBC had 7.8% of the industry they were bought out by Immediate Media in October 2011.

Currently in the UK there are 3,200 different consumer titles over the country this has increased from 1980 when there were only 1,383. Each year the magazine industry sells 1.4 billion copies of the product this has decreased greatly from 1970 when it was 2.1 billion but increased from 1992 when it was 1.2 billion. According to tests on average 85% of the population reads a magazine this proves it to be an industry that reaches all around the world and a large audience. In 2008 Advertisers spent £745 million on gaining space to advertise their product within a magazine annually.

Each year consumers spend £2 billion on keeping up to date with the latest addition of their favourite magazine, but some households may buy more than just one magazine throughout the year.  An average of 500 magazines get launched every year for the past decade these are made available to the public to begin with to test their success because only 3 in 10 make it past the first 4 years.

The top 5 Woman’s monthly magazines in 2013 are ‘Glamour’, ‘Cosmopolitan’, ‘yours’, ‘woman & home’ and ‘good housekeeping’. These are typically aimed at woman because they include fashion, gossip and ‘housekeeping’. Compared to the top 4 Men’s lifestyle magazines being ‘Men’s health’, ‘Nuts’, ‘FHM’ and ‘GQ’, these types of magazines do not include gossip as it’s not what they are typically interested in. ‘The top 5 children and teen magazines of 2013 are ‘Moshi Monsters’, ‘top of the pops’, ‘Cbeebies art’, ‘fun to learn- friends’ and ‘fun to learn – peppa pig’.