min magazine 2008 Back Talk
Friday, November 7, 2008

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As min editor-in-chief since June 1986, I have heard enough catchy sound bites to fill a chapter in Bartlett’s. One of most vivid came in late 1991, when I asked the then Magazine Publishers of America president Don Kummerfeld (1987-1999) whether that year’s 10 percent ad-page slump caused by the Persian Gulf War and George H.W. Bush’s 10 percent “luxury tax” on upscale products was the industry’s “Armageddon.” His two-word answer: It’s cyclical. How prophetic. By the second half of 1992, pages were up again, and soared for the rest of the decade thanks to two categories—prescription drugs and technology. “Cyclical” can also be applied to the 2001-2002 downturn, which looked horrendous on Sept. 12, 2001, the day after the terrorist attacks exacerbated the bursting of the dot-com bubble. Yet, fashion, shelter, food and drug advertising recovered quickly, as the post-9/11 emphasis on home and family resonated.

Enter 2008, an annus horribilis with the bad news from the “macro world”—high energy prices/home foreclosures/bank collapses/low consumer confidence, etc.—having a profound effect on magazines. The monthlies’ ad pages were off by double-digit percentages from June through November, with no relief in sight.

Unlike past recessions, virtually no sector has been immune. When a womens’ service magazine like Ladies’ Home Journal has a 32 percent ad dip in September (“sisters” Better Homes and Gardens/Family Circle/Good Housekeeping/Redbook/Woman’s Day were also down), it is evidence that packaged-goods advertisers are not switching to lower-CPM print to reach their mass audiences. But are they switching to the Internet? I have used this page before to write that the Internet complements magazines because the familiarity of brands—People.com, Forbes.com, etc.—gives them a clear advantage over unknown URLs.

For every HuffingtonPost.com and Slate.com, there are numerous sites that nobody has heard of. When the Web-savvy “millennials” enter the workforce, print and other “traditional” advertising may go by the wayside, but magazines with strong Web sites will live happily ever after. That may be the big one: a recession combined with a seismic shift in marketing. Is the current climate the catalyst to a digitally dominant advertising world where all the rules have changed? I can’t answer that—nobody can—but a hint that the “seismic shift” is on hold came from Mediapost.com’s Wayne Friedman. Two days after the end of the Beijing Olympics, he wrote: “NBC says it took in $1.025 billion in advertising sales, with virtually that entire amount coming from traditional TV venues, such as network TV. What about the Internet? According to one researcher, NBC collected a massive $5.4 million! Considering the event has been touted as the most-viewed TV event in human history, this would make NBC’s Internet efforts around 0.5% of its total advertising revenue take.”

So, are we back to the cyclical square one? Will Sir Isaac Newton’s “What goes up must come down/What goes down…” apply to magazines? One indicator will be Christmas: A “merry” retail holiday season would make 2009 a happier new year.

Good tidings to all.

Steve Cohn is min editor-in-chief.

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