While first-half magazine launches outpaced title shutdowns for the sixth year in a row, the bottom line isn’t great: net growth is dwindling.
First, the good news. MediaFinder’s report says that 60 magazines started printing in the first six months of 2015, while just 23 shuttered—a net gain of 37 publications.
The bad news is that launches are falling at an even faster rate. Gains are better than losses, but net additions to the industry have been steadily dropping for the last four years. And with a 41-percent decline in growth year-over-year, this marks the worst first half since the recession (there was a net gain of just three magazines in 2010).
The lack of investment in new titles echoes the dearth of M&A activity in the beginning of 2015. According to Petsky Prunier, deal value is way down for both consumer (-100 percent) and B2B (-87 percent) magazine media, with volume only slightly better (-70 percent and 22 percent, respectively).
For the full story read Folio Mag
and Petsky Prunier