Australian Magazines Keep Voyeurs Covered

“Royal shocker--Charles’ and Camilla’s sensational love tape . . . complete transcript.”

Australia’s New Idea magazine, with a circulation of more than 1 million, knew it was onto a winner with the latest scuttlebutt on the besieged British royal family.

A naked woman on all fours wearing a dog collar and leash, a topless British duchess and a picture of a Burmese rebel being stabbed to death--all have graced the covers of popular Australian magazines in the past year.

The country’s magazine industry, one of the toughest and most profitable in the world, is an assault on the senses.

Walk past a news agent’s shop and you’re accosted by a riot of posters depicting naked and half-clad women and carrying outrageous headlines of sexual tales.

Inside, the reader must navigate row upon row of magazines--everything from Australian Women’s Weekly and the local edition of Time, to Australian Penthouse and Street & Strip, which features more stripped women than cars.

“Our magazine industry is among the most profitable in the world and we produce a world-class product,” says Australian Sandra Yates, publisher of Time magazine in Australia.

“In all, some 1,400 different magazine titles are currently published in Australia. We are a nation of print junkies and habits like that are hard to break.”

But it’s not only the number of titles which impresses, but the circulation and readership figures.

Despite recession and with a population of only 17 million, Australia boasts three magazines with circulations of over a million, making it the biggest magazine market per capita in the world.

Industry analysts estimate that every adult and child in Australia buys 27 magazines a year.

As elsewhere, women’s magazines are by far the biggest sellers. The monthly Australian Women’s Weekly boasts a circulation of 1.15 million, the weekly Woman’s Day 1.02 million and New Idea 1.04 million, according to the latest industry audit.

With each sale attracting three to four readers, that gives the Weekly a monthly readership of up to 4.6 million--or 40% of all the women in Australia.

But publishers say there are five main reasons for the phenomenal success of Australian magazines--tradition, affluence, a high literacy level, news agents and voyeurism.