What’s happening to the grande dame of Australian magazines, the Women’s Weekly?
Circulation figures for the ACP giant released today show that it lost
30,700 copies an issue in the six months to June, taking its
circulation to 640,136, compared to 670,826 at the end of 2004 and more
than 680,000 a year ago: a very bad result.

It was a marginally better performance at Woman’s Day, the other ACP giant, with a 0.1% rise in circulation in the first half of 2005, but a 1% fall in the 12 month period to June.

That took the gloss off good performances by Cleo and Cosmo, which starred for the group. And ACP’s new Madison magazine had sales of 90,000 (a nice round publisher’s “estimate”), which pushed up ACP sales overall.

The news at rival Pacific Magazines, owned by the Seven Network, wasn’t bright as well. While New Idea saw a rise of 0.1% in the first half of this year and 0.3% in the past 12 months, sales of That’s Life and Family Circle have fallen 1.5% and 8.4% so far this year and 4% and 12.7% over the 12 months to June. Pacific’s teen/tweenies titles, Girlfriend, K-Zone, Total Girl and TV Hits had mixed fortunes. Girlfriend was up 8.5% for the 12 months to June.

The finance and business sector saw ACP’s Bulletin lose more ground, with sales down 2.4% so far in 2005 and 13.2% for the year to June.

Sales were put at 60,542. Fairfax’s BRW fell 8% in the 12 months to June, despite the good economy, stockmarket and resources boom.

Fairfax Business Media didn’t provide figures for Personal Investor, which is being closed. But they did reveal that the other mag which is being closed, Shares, experienced a 2% growth in sales this year to just over 60,000.

Time magazine’s sales fell 9.2% in the first six months of 2005 and 11.2% over the year, and ACP’s Money fell 3.1% to just over 48,500 and 8.8% for the year.

Burke’s Backyard
magazine, which is sold in conjunction with Don Burke’s company, CTC,
experienced a massive 20.9% drop in circulation this year and 21.2%
over the year to June. Sales dropped this year from 118,000 a month to
93,371 without the cross promotion of Don Burke’s TV program on Friday
nights at Nine. Pacific’s competitor in this area, Better Homes and Gardens, also took a pounding this year, even with a TV program to cross promote it. Better Homes
experienced a 6.1% circulation fall in 2005, which offset a rise in the
last half of 2004. That left sales over the year to June up 3.4%, which
will please Seven.