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Evening Standard: Magazine cover-mount wars

By David Rowan

IT could have been the reality-TV smash hit of the summer: Newsagent Survivor, in which volunteers are locked naked inside a remote branch of WH Smith, and forced to live only on what they can find affixed to magazine covers. Then again, perhaps this summer the challenge would have been too easy: apart from eating the Frusli bars stuck to Health &Fitness covers and drinking the absinthe offered free with Bizarre, they'd have been able to wear the T-shirts affixed to Shape, Elle and Star, the flip-flops cover-mounted with Cosmo, and the sunglasses given away with Tatler and GQ.

Not to mention the funky wrist cuffs offered with TV Hits.

This summer, competition has reached unprecedented levels on the news stand, with circulation directors relying as ever before on cover-mounted gifts. The trend is expensive, risks damaging the editorial brand, and produces rapidly diminishing returns, but according to the publishers, the greater risk lies in not joining in. "We're in a spiral of competition, and I can't see anyone saying it's a great thing," laments Peter Stuart, publishing director at Condé Nast's GQ. "It boosts sales in the short term, but the trend can't increase much further before there's a reaction."

GQ previously encouraged sampling with giveaway books, supplements, CD-Roms and music CDs before its circulation department offered Stuart the "surprisingly reasonable" sunglasses affixed to July's cover. "You hope that a proportion of the new readers you attract will stay, and you also hope to boost your six-month ABC,"he explains,"although nowadays agencies know what's going on and ask for circulation figures for each issue. "In Stuart's experience, music CDs are among the most effective circulation-boosters, but can cost up to £1. 30 each. Yet with Esquire this month offering a pack of cards against GQ's sunglasses, Stuart fears diminishing returns from such investments (often in six figures) especially in such a competitive climate when, in theory, "I could put a free £1 coin on the cover, and Esquire could offer a £5 note."

But the "gift war" carries other risks. Over at IPC Ignite, which publishes music and lifestyle magazines including Loaded, Uncut and NME, marketing director Vijay Solanka warns Condé Nast that it's making "a very dangerous move". "I'm not convinced those GQ sunglasses reflect a magazine that's perceived to be an upmarket brand. Try them down the King's Road and see what response you get."

The key, says Solanka, is to ensure that gifts fulfil a genuine need and are relevant to a magazine's audience. For men's magazines such as Loaded, editorial supplements have proved a banker;for film and music magazines, CDs work if they offer exclusive tracks. "Our best cover-mount yet was a Beatles compilation for Uncut's 50th, when bands such as Echo and the Bunnymen recorded tracks for us," he says. "We expect a significant increase in sales, as the CD is clearly relevant to its target audience."

It's not difficult to see why magazines are turning to evermore aggressive retail tactics. In 1990, 2,184 consumer magazines were published in Britain; by 1999 it was 3,174 - even though total sales in that time grew by just five per cent. "In an increasingly crowded and competitive news trade, cover mounts are an extremely effective way of encouraging testing of the product," says Philip Cutts, director of marketing at the Periodical Publishers' Association. If chosen carefully, he adds, they can also prove effective marketing tools in themselves. "Take the famous Elle bag you suddenly saw enormous numbers walking around promoting a magazine."

ELLE's heavily branded bag giveaways of the mid-1990s shook up an industry that had seen cover mounts largely in terms of Beano whoopee cushions and classical CDs. Suddenly, according to Justine Chaplin, who has sourced bags and other gifts for Elle, magazines saw that giveaways could increase sales by 100 per cent although today 20 or 30 per cent would be more likely. Chaplin, whose company TCS (Europe) Ltd is one of the leading "premium sourcing companies " working with UK magazines, now sees the market as "pretty saturated it's gone crazy, and there's only one way to go".

You can thank Chaplin this month for your J17 bag, your New Woman organiser and your Elle slashneck top. What makes the deals possible, she says, is "cheap labour" in the Far East (especially China), from where 70 per cent of the goods are sourced.

On average, she says, publishers pay from 25p to 30p per gift even if magazines tell you they're "worth £12. 99". She can get you a lip gloss for 5p, a whoopee cushion for 6p or a pen for 2p; as for the elegant summer vests, these can be had for around 50p, as can many of the glamour bags currently on the newsstands. As for the GQ and Tatler summer shades, Chaplin (who wasn't par t of those deals)reckons they would have cost just 30p. It's only the part-work teddy bears, and some types of clothing, that tend to go above £1.

But Dylan Jones, editor of GQ, doesn't feel his editorial product is cheapened by the add-ons. He works with his publisher to choose the gifts just as at Tatler, the fashion director was given the final say on this month's sunglasses. "I have no problem with it, as long as the publication is offering something it's fairly certain its readers will want and every man in his right mind would want these," Jones says, proudly displaying his aviator sunglasses as he strolls through Notting Hill.

(Evening Standard, June 20 2001)

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Media inquiries:
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