• by Erik Sass  @eriksass1, April 29, 2010

While other consumer magazine categories seem to be adrift, newspaper-distributed magazines are alive and kicking. Nashville's Athlon Sports Communications says it plans to launch a new newspaper-distributed magazine, Athlon Sports, this October. The new magazine will debut with a circulation of 7 million, which Athlon boasts will make it the largest sports magazine in the country.

The new newspaper magazine will profile celebrity athletes, provide preseason insights from top sports editors and include plenty of sports feature stories from around the country. In so doing, it aims to provide endemic advertisers in the sports category with a mass-audience alternative to established sports titles.

Through the planned 7 million circulation, Athlon hopes to reach more than 25 million sports fans a month.

The news comes as Stephen Duggan announced his acquisition of a minority stake in the company and moved into the role of president for Athlon Media Communications.

Duggan previously served as publisher of Maxim, and before that helped found the Publishing Group of America, which publishes three newspaper-distributed magazines: American Profile, Relish and Spry. The current performance of these magazines suggests the viability of the newspaper distribution model. While the magazine business in general saw ad pages fall 9% in the first quarter of 2010, according to the Publishers Information Bureau, American Profile was up 55.1%, Relish hit 16.8% and Spry rose 17.2%.

Other newspaper-distributed magazines are also faring relatively well: Parade was up 22.1% and USA Today up 5.1% in the first quarter.

Modern Luxury Hits the Auction Block

Modern Luxury Media -- which publishes regional luxury titles, including Modern Luxury Dallas, Modern Luxury Hawaii, San Francisco, Manhattan, The Atlantan and Angeleno -- is for sale, according to the New York Post.

The company was seized in February by creditors, including New Star Financial Services and GE Financial Services. The current management hopes to either find a buyer or raise capital with a new equity partner. It cites a recent 15% uptick in advertising revenues as evidence of the luxury publisher's viability. The NYP says Modern Luxury Media has hired Berkery Noyes to oversee the sale.

ABM Includes Digital Revenues in BIN Reports

American Business Media is set to begin incorporating digital revenues and revenues from business data services into its Business Information Network reports, which previously only covered print publication advertising and trade show revenues. The news comes not long after ABM reported that B2B print revenues tumbled 24% in 2009 compared to 2008, to $7.5 billion. In 2009, print ads contributed just 36% of total B2B revenues -- behind trade shows, which contributed 45%, but ahead of digital, at 19.1%.

Vaccariello Leaves Prevention

Liz Vaccariello is leaving her roles as senior vice president and editor in chief of Prevention, according to Rodale. No replacement has been selected as yet; in the interim, Prevention 's editorial operations will be managed by senior vice president and editorial director Bill Stump. Vaccariello will continue to be employed by Rodale as a spokesperson for two books she wrote while editor: Flat Belly Diet! and 400 Calorie Fix.