Ad Slump Continues for Magazines as TV Grabs a Bigger Share
The recession that gripped the magazine industry earlier this year showed little sign of easing in the second quarter, according to figures released Tuesday by the industry’s leading trade group.
Total advertising pages, off 3.5% in the first quarter from the year-earlier period, slid 3.3% for the first six months of 1990, the Magazine Publishers of America said. The figures are derived from a survey of 173 member magazines.
The continued weakness was a disappointment for industry officials who have predicted that the slump would be no more than a brief interruption in growth.
The two categories of advertising that were most to blame for the weakness showed no improvement in the second quarter. Tobacco advertising, off 25% in dollar value for the first quarter, was off 27% for the first half. Auto industry advertising, down 7.4% for the first three months, was off 12.5% for the first six months.
Magazine analysts said that in a year of generally flat advertising budgets, many major advertisers have been apportioning more to television, to keep up with cable’s expansion and the increase in network TV rates.
“To keep pace on the TV side, advertisers don’t have as much to spend on magazines,” said David Lehmkuhl, an independent magazine consultant in New York.
Among the top 10 revenue-producing magazines, the ad page comparisons for the six-month period were:
Time, down 8%; People, down 10%; Sports Illustrated, down 17%; TV Guide, down 10%; Newsweek, down 9%; Business Week, down 9%; Forbes, up 8%; Good Housekeeping, up 7%; Fortune, down 6%, and U.S. News & World Report, down 4%.
