• by Larry Dobrow , May 8, 2003

With the release of the latest Publishers Information Bureau (PIB) advertising revenue and pages data on Thursday, the magazine business received another small dose of good news. And while few people within the industry were ready to break out the champagne, most believe that the dread of the last 24 months is finally behind them.

Total magazine advertising revenue in April reached $1.62 billion (up 8.5% over April 2002 levels), even though the number of ad pages decreased 2.3% to 19,677.3. The year-to-date numbers looked slightly better: ad revenue was up 9.8% to $5.32 billion, with pages surging 3.1%

Having weathered a difficult last few years, Magazine Publishers of America executive vice president/chief marketing officer Ellen Oppenheim didn't seem especially eager to celebrate the uptick in revenue and pages. She did, however, express great confidence that the industry's recovery would continue in the months ahead.

"I entered the year cautiously optimistic, understanding that we were coming off a relatively soft first half of 2002 [for comparison purposes] but also recognizing economic and potential war concerns entering 2003," she says. "We're still living with a lot of that economic and political uncertainty, but I'm as confident as ever about the role of magazines in the advertising mix."

Of the 12 major advertising categories tracked by PIB, nine grew their revenues in April, though ad pages were down in eight. The automotive (+19.6% in ad revenue, +14.5% in ad pages), drugs and remedies (13.3%, 9.8%), toiletries and cosmetics (10.7%, 6.3%), and home furnishings and supplies (18.2%, 4.3%) categories all saw increased revenues and pages over April 2002 levels. The direct response (-2.7%, -12.0%), public transportation, hotels and resorts (-9.8%, -7.1%), and financial, insurance and real estate (-2.8%, -7.0%) categories were double-losers compared to the year-ago period.

The year-to-date category breakdowns were more favorable. Nine out of 12 categories grew revenues compared to the January-April 2002 period, and eight of 12 saw ad-page jumps. Automotive (+25.6% in ad revenue, +23.4% in ad pages) and drugs and remedies (24.5%, 19.4%) posted double-digit percentage gains, while direct response (-0.3%, -5.5%), technology (-4.4%, -5.8%), and financial, insurance and real estate (-0.4%, -5.4%) lost ground in revenue and pages.

Oppenheim cautioned against drawing big-picture conclusions about a particular category based on the PIB numbers. "Within each category, there are so many factors to consider," she notes. "For example, if movie advertising pages are down, that could just be a function of the number of movies released during the period."

On a broader basis, Oppenheim stated the obvious: that the categories which were down were those that faced greater economic pressures. It doesn't take a master's degree in marketing, for example, to postulate why travel and tourism companies didn't rush to advertise in magazines during the last few months.

Similarly, the relative boom in the home furnishings category was not entirely unexpected. "The combination of low interest rates and concerns about the state of the world fueled a real nesting syndrome," Oppenheim explains. As for automotive claiming its usual place at the front of the pack, she added, "When the largest category keeps increasing, that's a good sign [for magazines]."

The PIB data for individual magazines showed the following publications doubled their ad revenue on a percentage basis over 2002 in the year-to-date period: Weight Watchers (163.2%), Elle Girl (156.6%), Blender (146.3%), Real Simple (136.6%), Lucky (112.2%) and Nick Jr. (112.2%). Oppenheim declined to evaluate the performance of specific magazines, but noted, "Individual publications will always reflect the mix of advertisers within them. As individual PIB categories experience ups and down, publications that emphasize those categories will generally feel the impact."