The Business of Magazines

[velvetandsilk]

Thing is, I don’t even believe this to be true. At the dawn of the everything pro-China sentiment, I highly doubt they’re even considering a Singaporean/Taiwanese/HK editor. Lol, nice try CN.

You are right. If you want run a business in China you need Chinese agent with good social and political connections.

 

[MDNA]

 

[Hafyiez wafa]

Is Margaret Zhang the New Vogue China Editorial Director?

 

[Xone]

Is Margaret Zhang the New Vogue China Editorial Director?

There is a way to see the whole article? Thank you very much!

 

[MDNA]

There is a way to see the whole article? Thank you very much!

LONDON — Speculation surrounding influencer and filmmaker Margaret Zhang getting the top job at Vogue China has been buzzing in New York and Beijing for the past few days.

Influencer Bryan Boy tweeted Wednesday to congratulate Zhang’s potential appointment. “Congratulations Margaret Zhang — if she is the new Vogue China Editor in Chief!” he said, and later retweeted himself, adding that “The keyword is *IF! Nothing is confirmed until an announcement so y’all hold your horses.”

Sources in China, though, say otherwise regarding Zhang’s possible appointment, as one version indicates that the new editor is coming from Malaysia.

Condé Nast Communications later retweeted that “Nothing to announce yet @bryanboy. We’re finalizing our Vogue China Editor-in-Chief decision and will share with the world soon.” This brief statement didn’t confirm or deny Zhang’s appointment.

Zhang could not be reached immediately for comment.

Regardless, Zhang is no stranger to Vogue China. She produced two digital covers for the launch issue of Vogue Me in 2016.

The Australian-born-Chinese Zhang, 27, has made a name for herself in the fashion industry as an influencer, model, photographer, writer and consultant since the launch of her website in 2009. She has worked with several fashion labels and publications globally, and she was also the first Asian face to front the cover of Elle Australia. The Face magazine appointed Zhang as creative director at large for Asia for its relaunch in 2019.

But in recent years, Zhang has generally moved away from fashion to work on her first full-length feature film.

As first reported by WWD, Anna Wintour, who was promoted to chief content officer at the company in December, has been interviewing candidates with an overseas Chinese background in the past month to succeed Angelica Cheung, who stepped down last month. Cheung launched the magazine 16 years ago.

While Zhang is a name coming up frequently in the discussions, no one can confirm whether she will be the new editor in chief. The response to Bryan Boy’s Twitter feed has been positive so far.

One source within Condé Nast China worries that Zhang’s lack of experience in the Chinese publishing market, which has been increasingly diverging from the West, could mean it would take some time for her to learn the entirety of the role.

As the speculation continues, a source told WWD that Wintour reached out to Hung Huang for the job, but Huang turned down the offer. Another source said Wintour has also reached out to several former Vogue China editors to fill the vacancy, but none agreed to do so in the end.

WWD

 

[GivenchyAddict]

^There is a big pool of local talents in China for this role. If they are not capable to have one, it will mean that CN China is a sinking ship!

 

[Hafyiez wafa]

At Dazed Magazine, a Changing of the Guard

Ibrahim Kamara new EIC for Dazed Magazine ?

 

[Benn98]

Actually, I'd be into it! Dazed never had a diversity problem and the magazine still relies on Robbie Spencer's legacy, stylistically speaking. So maybe someone new like IK who has a very specific styling identity would actually be great for them.

 

[GivenchyAddict]

^Definitely. That's a wonderful news. I really look forward to seeing his work at Dazed then near VHI for example.

Dazed has been quite a disappointment lately so the duo Pavarotti x Ib for them would be wonderful.

 

[JPineapple]

 

[LoveFashion25]

I still think its sad what vogue has become.

 

[MDNA]

China’s New Generation of Fashion Media Powerbrokers
by Casey Hall

A new editor-in-chief at Vogue China, expected to be announced any day now, is just the latest in a string of new editors appointed to China’s most important fashion titles in recent years.

They take the reins from a powerful cohort of long-standing editors: women like Su Mang, Shaway Yeh and Xiao Xue, who are credited with building China’s fashion media culture from the ground up over a period of several decades.

News of Angelica Cheung’s departure from Vogue China late last year after almost 16 years in the top job marked the end of that era. Her successor will not only inherit the highest-profile fashion media job in the world’s largest fashion market, but they will also do so at a time when the role of traditional media seems to have reached a tipping point in China.

“Angelica was the queen and I don’t think there will be another queen who has the same power. That doesn’t exist anymore,” said Lily Chou, who herself is the editor-in-chief of Shanghai-based independent fashion and art bi-annual Rouge Fashion Book and part of a dynamic young generation contributing niche points of view to China’s modern fashion publishing conversation.

Chou is one of many who see this as the end of a golden age of powerful fashion editors. Three years ago, the concentration of power the three editors had consolidated was viewed as a potential threat. Publishing companies had to consider whether the personal brands of chief editors outshined the titles they represented. Today, they are gone and many in China would struggle to name-check their successors.

“[Cheung and Elle China founding editor] Xiao Xue created something; they created it, the next generation are just inheriting it, so their job is to keep that well-oiled machine running and deal with the challenges that will come along the way,” Chou said.

This shift seems a natural part of the evolution of China’s fashion media, which rose with astronomical speed in its early years, only to correct course just as quickly to face up to the digital revolution that threatens its existence. Indeed, staying afloat is a tough enough job for any fashion magazine today.

Though China’s fashion magazine market has remained somewhat resilient when compared with its counterparts in other countries, it is subject to the same broader social and technological factors that have disrupted the traditional media industry elsewhere. In some ways, these changes have been even more dramatic in China, where digitisation has been so enthusiastically embraced.

Reflecting on the “drastic” disruptions to China’s media industry over the past decade, Tommy Tse, assistant professor in media and culture at The University of Hong Kong’s Department of Sociology, explained that there has been a discernible effect on brands. “The impact of not only digitisation but also platformisation, [means] we [are witnessing] key changes in Chinese fashion and luxury consumption practices,” he explained.

The entire fashion journey, in other words, from inspiration to consumer purchase, is now performed online in China, with advertising budgets for print campaigns shrinking as brands need to spend more and more money converting readers online via expensive marketing investments on Chinese social media platforms, such as WeChat and Xiaohongshu, as well as e-commerce platforms, such as Tmall.

So, who are the editors now charged with fending off competition from increasingly influential KOLs (key opinion leaders) and other digital-first content publishers, now seeing the industry through this period of disruption?

The Ultimate Insiders

An oft-told story claims that founding editor, Su Mang, and long-time fashion director, Sha Xiaoli, pulled together the first editorial team of Harper’s Bazaar China in under ten days.

The first issue of the magazine was released in November 2001, and from that time, up until Su’s departure from the title in 2018, Sha Xiaoli was a loyal lieutenant and the logical choice to succeed Su.

Following Su’s decision to leave the magazine, Sha stepped into the joint roles of editor-in-chief and general manager, where she has cut a noticeably lower-profile figure than Su, formerly a regular feature of television interviews and red carpet appearances, known for being outspoken and occasionally controversial.

Sha may be less outspoken than her predecessor, and she is quick to acknowledge the challenges digital competition presents legacy fashion media brands rooted in print. But she maintains that this also presents an opportunity.

“We can use this bigger [digital] platform to reach more readers and educate them from zero about trends in fashion, culture, art and design,” she told BoF, adding that the size of China’s market means there are still opportunities that remain untapped, with many consumers working their way into the middle class requiring the kind of mass-market fashion and luxury lifestyle education provided by major fashion titles.

“I believe we will always have a print version of Harper’s Bazaar. It has value as something you can own or keep, but the magazine of the future needs to be more inspiring than a useful shopping guide,” she said.

Like Sha, Xue Jian, who is also known by the English name Nicole Xue, was a long-time deputy before nabbing the top job at Elle China in 2019. Xue succeeded Xiao Xue, whom she had worked with since Xiao Xue first joined the publication in 2006 (Xue Jian joined the title a year earlier, in 2005).

The newly minted editor at Modern Weekly Style, Duscher Tang, also spent years working his way up the ranks of the Modern Media publishing group in the years Shaway Yeh, group style editorial director and editorial director for Modern Weekly, built the latter into a unique and acclaimed Chinese fashion and lifestyle publication with a progressive, edgy lens.

Tang left Modern Media for stints at local editions of T Magazine and WSJ Magazine before returning to Modern Weekly and taking over as chief editor in 2020.

The appointments of long-time fashion media insiders to top roles have established a path to the top of the masthead, one that makes Condé Nast China’s search for a new editor (one that has reportedly focused outside the beltway of Chinese fashion publishing, and even perhaps outside Mainland China itself) so interesting, if conjecture regarding candidates for the job, such as Australian-born influencer Margaret Zhang and Malaysian national Wish Teoh (a former employee of both Vogue China and Numero China), is to be believed.

New Era, New Skill Set

China’s original generation of powerhouse fashion editors didn’t work their way up the ladder to their top jobs — largely because there was no ladder to speak of when they were starting out in fashion magazine publishing. Angelica Cheung, for example, initially embarked on a business career as an investment banker at Goldman Sachs before pivoting to publishing.

What these editors did share was an intimate understanding of Mainland China and its potential to become the preeminent market for luxury and fashion.

Tommy Tse says the importance of this local experience and deep level of familiarity with the local industry should not be underestimated.

“Knowing the mainland culture and lifestyle, having a good level of social, cultural and symbolic capital, and understanding what the political boundaries are, are all, of course, important for a mainland fashion media leader to survive and thrive,” Tse explained.

However, Tse added a caveat. Local knowledge is not the only asset important for editors stepping into the shoes of China’s iconic first generation. In fact, Tse says, a legacy mindset is likely to be as much of a hindrance in today’s environment as a lack of familiarity with the local market.

“Being too familiar with and ingrained in how the fashion system worked in the past sometimes may hinder one to change and embrace new challenges too,” he said.

Just as important will be skills such as understanding algorithms, machine learning and consumer data, “a sharp eye for interpreting the new generation’s cultural and aesthetic preferences without simply imposing irrelevant, unrelatable styles and not just uncreatively following the mass trends,” Tse explained.

Indeed, this new generation of editors, including whoever takes over from Cheung at Vogue China, will need an armoury of weapons to overcome the challenges facing the fashion media at this time of great upheaval.

BOF

 

[Benn98]

Allure Magazine Is Entering Brick-and-Mortar Retail
Media is continuing to try to monetize brands outside of traditional print.

By Kathryn Hopkins on January 28, 2021

As the pandemic continues to weigh on the economy, many retailers have been forced to shutter physical stores around the world, but there are a few brands — and not just traditional retail types — that have been quietly moving in the opposite direction.

Among them is Condé Nast-owned Allure magazine, which is gearing up to open its first physical retail store in New York City’s SoHo neighborhood during the fall, through a licensing partnership with STÔUR Group, which specializes in turning online destinations into physical retail and will manage operations.

When it opens its doors, the 2,900-square-foot Lafayette Street store will be set over two floors and will feature around 300 makeup, hair-care and skin-care products at any given time, curated by staffers at Allure, which will celebrate its 30th anniversary this year. The store will also offer augmented reality capabilities for customers to try on products, as well as smart mirrors, and when it’s safe for live events to return, Allure’s editorial team plan to regularly host in-store events, tutorials and masterclasses.

While opening a store for the first time during the current climate may raise some eyebrows, Markus Grindel, managing director of global brand licensing at Condé Nast, believes its “360-degree immersive retail experience” will be key to its success.

“There are many different reasons I think stores are closing and some of that is related to or accelerated by the pandemic. But I think brick-and-mortar has been struggling before because the concept in general hasn’t kept up with the change in consumer behavior,” he told WWD. “Stores these days still try to serve the pre-Instagram consumer that they have been serving for decades and I think consumers today shop through media, through headlines, through influencers and content. That’s really what is driving consumption and the store that we’re going to open is built entirely around that sort of future — this immersive environment which is created by the experts like Michelle [Lee, Allure’s editor in chief] and her team.”

Lee added that the hope is that the store can build off the success of its beauty recommendations and The Allure Beauty Box, a handpicked selection of editor-approved beauty products that launched in 2012, of which revenue has risen 20 percent year-over-year.

“It makes a lot of sense for us to have this physical space where people can shop our stories and our recommendations. There will be a section in the store always around Best of Beauty Award winners,” she said.

Allure is just one of a number of media brands branching out of traditional print and advertising revenue streams. Print advertising was an area that was already struggling across the entire media industry, only to be exacerbated by the coronavirus pandemic.

Hearst-owned Cosmopolitan magazine has released a perfume, a furniture line and a wine brand Uncorked, while Meredith’s InStyle has collaborated with a number of clothing brands under its Badass franchise. Elsewhere, The New Yorker, also published by Condé Nast, released new branded merchandise including playing cards illustrated by cartoonist Edward Steed, socks featuring the magazine’s monocled mascot Eustace Tilley, coffee mugs, pencils and notebooks, T-shirts and even a new baby onesie.

But while retail will play a bigger part in Allure’s future, Lee insisted that print remains core to the brand despite rumors that it could be the next Condé-owned publication to go digital only.

WWD

 

[MON]

So what happened to Ms. Zhang..... and Bryanboy.....

 

[8eight]

Anne Marie Curtis - Ex UK Elle editor is launching a new magazine
https://www.instagram.com/thecalendarmagazine/

Can a glossy magazine even be sustainable?

 

[Benn98]

VICE MEDIA WILL STOP PUBLISHING 'GARAGE' MAGAZINE

But the publication isn't shutting down entirely.

WHITNEY BAUCK
JAN 12, 2021

Vice Media will soon cease publishing Garage, a fashion-meets-art publication, according to a report by Business of Fashion — but the magazine isn't expected to totally shutter.

The announcement comes after a tough year for fashion media, as advertising budgets dropped off in response to declines in consumer spending. Garage in particular was projected to fall $4 million short of its originally expected $10 million in advertising in 2020. As a result, Vice is pulling funding away from Garage and is expected to instead invest more heavily in i-D, another fashion-focused title it owns. According to Business of Fashion, the company will stop publishing Garage in in the spring of this year, and employees will start receiving severance pay in March.

"As our company continues to expand, it is critical to focus on opportunities aligned with our strategy," a Vice representative said, in a statement to Business of Fashion. “The 10th anniversary edition this spring will celebrate all that the publication stands for. We wish Garage all the best as it moves forward into its next exciting phase."

Dasha Zhukova. Per Business of Fashion, she intends to return it to its roots as a "radical art object." However, her strategy for keeping the publication going isn't entirely clear yet: A few options include partnering with another media publisher or using the art museum after which the publication is named, the Garage Museum of Contemporary Art (which Zhukova also founded) to publish the magazine.

Fashionista

 

[Xone]

The director of EL PAÍS, Javier Moreno, has appointed Eugenia de la Torriente as deputy director of the newspaper. De la Torriente will promote the creation of content in the areas of culture, magazines and lifestyle with the aim of generating a coordinated, compact and relevant offer in digital and printed editions. Moreno has also appointed a new deputy director, Maribel Marín, who will be responsible for the weekend's content.
De la Torriente will coordinate the sections on Culture and Screens. and People and Babelia and El Viajero supplements, as well as El País Semanal and Icon and S Moda magazines. She will lead innovation in the field of events and experiences, creating a proposal of high journalistic and creative value for readers.

From El Pais.com

The complete article here:
Eugenia de la Torriente, directora adjunta de EL PAÍS

 

[axiomatic]

People Magazine Delves Deeper Into Royal Coverage With New Magazine

Do you have a burning desire to find out what the British royal family’s favorite tipple is, hear what Princess Diana’s astrologer has to say about your zodiac sign or how Prince Albert of Monaco is navigating the pandemic? People magazine has you covered.

The Meredith Corp.-owned publication, which covers royal gossip every day across its multiple platforms, is delving even deeper into the subject with the launch of a 100-page quarterly magazine, People Royals.

The magazine, which hits newsstands in early March at $12.99, will cover royal families around the world, but with a heavy focus on the British royal family. The first cover star is the Duchess of Cambridge with an inside feature titled, “Kate the Great: How the Future Queen Is Defining Herself.”

While the Duchess of Cambridge didn’t speak to the publication, some royals — and some former royals — have. In the first issue, there is a first-person essay penned by Sarah Ferguson, Duchess of York, titled “What Tea-Time Means to Me.” Elsewhere, Prince Albert of Monaco talks about his life in quarantine during the pandemic in between features on royal jewels, the best British castles to stay at, food and drink recommendations and royal quizzes.

“The subject of the royals is consistently the highest engaged across many of our platforms. It’s a strong seller on the newsstand and a lot of digital subscribers respond to it. I just felt that as a stand-alone brand it had a lot of potential,” said Dan Wakeford, editor in chief of People, of his decision to move forward with a specialist royal print publication, citing that William and Kate’s wedding in 2011 and Harry and Meghan’s wedding in 2018 remain among the bestselling issues.

This is not the first time People has branched out from its main weekly magazine when it comes to the British royal family. Most recently, it has teamed with The CW Network for two upcoming one-hour documentary specials. The first, “People Presents: Harry & Meghan’s American Dream,” is set to air March 30, and the second, “People Presents: William & Kate’s Royal Anniversary,” will air April 29.

Other People projects include People Health, which is distributed in surgical offices; an upcoming weekday podcast called “People Every Day,” and its own TV show, which made its debut in September. There is also another print launch coming, but Wakeford would not give any details about the subject.

Many magazines cut frequency last year amid the pandemic, while the number of launches halved

 

[axiomatic]

Conde Nast is exploring taking office space in New Jersey and reducing its presence in Manhattan as part of a bid to cut costs, according to people familiar with the matter.

The magazine publisher, a high-profile tenant at One World Trade Center, is looking for roughly 400,000 square feet (37,161 square meters) of office space split between Manhattan and the New Jersey waterfront, the people said, asking not to be named because the matter is private.

Conde Nast, owned by Advance Publications, is struggling as print publications lose advertising revenue. It has about a million square feet of space at One World Trade, some of which it has subleased in recent years after cutting staff. The company has been looking to exit or modify the lease.

“Advance continues to be in discussions about bringing the lease in 1WTC into line with current market conditions and its ongoing needs at that location,” a representative for Advance said in a statement. “We are also considering alternative solutions to address these requirements.”

Conde Nast, the publisher of prestigious titles including Vogue, Vanity Fair and the New Yorker, has been in talks for months with its current landlords -- the Durst Organization and the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey.

The company is an anchor tenant at One World Trade, originally signing a 25-year lease. It’s unclear whether the firm will be able to exit or change the lease.

“One World Trade Center is proud to be the home of Conde Nast, which includes some of the world’s most iconic and respected brands,” Jordan Barowitz, a spokesman for Durst, said in a statement. “Conde Nast has 19 years left on their lease and we don’t expect them to go anywhere.”

Conde Nast’s move south from Times Square, announced in 2011, was pivotal as landlords tried to draw tenants downtown in the years after the attacks of Sept. 11. The company started moving employees to One World Trade late in 2014.

The company’s bid to cut its presence in Manhattan comes as many firms reassess their office needs after months with employees at home. Office space available for rent rose to the highest level since 2003, reaching 13.5% in November, according to a report by Colliers International.

— With assistance by Gerry Smith

ouch...

bloomberg

 

[reesewu]

“Conde Nast is exploring taking office space in New Jersey”

LOL I never thought I’d see the day. This publication has been known for its Manhattan elitism just like Woody Allen for years. I mean, even Miranda from SATC only went to Brooklyn.~