New Magazine Will Target Divorced Readers

If your marriage is on the rocks, or if it’s history, a Maryland publisher thinks he has the magazine for you.

Jonathan Adler plans to debut his new magazine about divorce, Marital Status, this May in Maryland.

The market is certainly there. More than half of American marriages end in divorce. In 1994, the year for which the most recent figures are available, there were 17.3 million divorced people nationwide, according to the U.S. Census Bureau.

Adler says he got the idea for a magazine from his father, who wrote “War of the Roses,” a 1979 book about an exceptionally ugly divorce that was made into a dark comedy film starring Kathleen Turner and Michael Douglas 10 years later.

“The interesting thing is, he and I are both happily married, and each of us have three children,” Adler said.

“He wrote about the dark side of divorce and it probably was the most popular film ever on divorce,” Adler said. “And family and friends talked about it, and the issue kept coming up again and again.”

Adler’s magazine will focus on four topics--separation, divorce, being single again and getting married again. Adler envisions how-to advice columns on such topics as lawyers, handling the emotional side of a divorce and getting back into the dating scene.

What advertisers does he expect to target? Therapists, private investigators, plastic surgeons and orthodontists.

The magazine will appear twice yearly and carry a newsstand price of $9.95 an issue.

“The readership will be moving through the four phases and the publication comes out every six months because we think that’s the cycle of the phases,” he said. “It’s not a subscription-based publication. The purpose of the product is for them to educate themselves on whatever transition they are going through.”

Adler formed his Silver Spring-based publishing firm, the Adler Group, in 1988, and has been in publishing since the 1970s.

During the 1980s, he published an apartment guide and a society magazine called Washington Dossier, which he later sold. He bought two trade papers that cover commercial real estate in 1990 and 1991, which he also runs.

Adler said he plans to introduce the magazine in Maryland in May and expand to Virginia in September. He hopes to eventually expand to 21 states with localized magazines for each state.

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Adler said he hopes readership in Maryland will be 120,000 a year, and 160,000 a year in Virginia. Once the magazine is available in the 21 states, Adler hopes readership to exceed 5 million a year.

The biggest stumbling block so far has been finding an editor with the right experience, which Adler thinks should include surviving a divorce.

The magazine already has competition from Divorce magazine, a Chicago-based publication which debuted in August, and also plans to expand by offering local editions in other markets.

But Samir Husni, a University of Mississippi journalism professor who publishes an annual guide to consumer magazines, said both publications miss the mark.

“The problem with all these magazines is they are aiming at a negative subject. That is not why people buy magazines,” he said. “ We always left it up to television and newspapers to give us the bad news.

“When you have a magazine like Divorce or Marital Status, the very first message it sends is that there is something wrong. Do you want to be reminded at home of those problems, or do you want to go and bury yourself in a publication that will take you out of that world?”

Husni also does not expect the magazine to develop a loyal following because of the transient nature of the audience.

However, Adler feels his magazine can achieve the same success bridal magazines enjoy, which also rely on a transient audience.

“The purpose is for them to educate themselves on whatever transition they are going through,” he said.