Rolling Stone, America’s music magazine, has done something radical. They have announced a decreased their publication of the hard copy magazine from twice a month to only once a month.
This change comes six months after Penske Media bought a big chunk of the magazine’s parent company, Wenner Media. Although the circulation of the magazine is shrinking, the actual magazine is getting bigger, packing more content and more photos. The format and the layout of the magazine are going to change featuring heavier paper stock and highlight photos.
The Wall Street Journal has reported that the price of Rolling Stone went from only $5.99 to $9.99. The prestigious magazine has doubled in cost. Gus Wenner, the president and chief operating officer of Wenner Media also happens to be the son of Rolling Stone co-founder Jann Wenner. He said in an interview with Wall Street Journal, “Our strategy is to go much deeper in our core areas: music, politics and entertainment. For us to succeed, we need an authentic audience, readers who are buying our magazine. We want to set ourselves up for long-term success. You can’t do that if you are creating a fake audience for your magazine and are buying tons of traffic online.”
Rolling Stone, first founded in 1967 by Jann Wenner, the magazine’s publisher, and Ralph J. Gleason. The magazine was first known for their music coverage and political reporting. In the 1990s, there was a shift of how the magazin reached its audience. The audience reached out towards the younger readership, those who were interested in music and youth-oriented tv shows.
Today, the magazine covers a range of topics and reaches many different readers.
Their web design is not going out of style. The website is still alive and well. However, print copies of the magazine will be more expensive and for those who really delight in reading in person what’s going on in the music sphere.
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