Mr. Magazine

And I do not mean just the weather temperature, but rather the amount of magazines launched for the first time during the month of November 2009. Only 43 new titles made it to the nation’s newsstands compared with 89 titles in November of 2008. A drop of almost 50% from the same period last year.

There were 11 magazines launched last month with an intended regular frequency in 09. In November 08 there were 20 magazines with similar intended frequency. All the others were specials and one time shots.
Some of the new magazines arriving for the first time to the nation’s newsstands show the quality only a print medium can only deliver such as the case with Vintage magazine. Another magazine takes an old topic such as Christmas and turns into a quarterly magazine celebrating (and aptly named) Christmas 365 days a year. Susie magazine, on the other hand, offers Christian teens an outlet to share their opinions and advice. The area where it is starting to show some recovery and growth is in regional magazines such as the new Louisiana magazine Scene. And last but not least, a new magazine celebrating the lifestyles and values of nurses called Scrubs.
So how are we doing so far this year? Well, according to the early statistics we had four months where the launches this year were more than last, and seven months where 08 saw more launches than 09. However, we have a total of approximately 650 titles so far, very close to the 685 total of 2008. Therefore, Dec. is going to be the deal breaker whether this year will exceed the number of new launches from last year or not. So keep your fingers crossed, continue to celebrate the newborns arriving on the market place and never lose hope in an industry that knows it is in transition and is finding ways to deal with that.