First half U.S. magazine ad numbers

The first half advertising numbers for U.S. consumer magazines are in and the winners and losers are no surprise to anyone. In fact, ad pages are flat and revenue overall up slightly. The full results are available from the Publishers Information Bureau at the Magazines Publishers of America. (Note, all PIB data is based on reported page counts multiplied by published rate card price and no allowance is made for discounts or premiums.)

PIB says the overall revenue for the measured magazines is up about 3.2% but ad pages are off 0.2% percent. Nine of 11 ad categories showed dollar and page growth in June.

• TV Guide's redesign and reformatting apparently failed dismally and the publication lost $100 million in ad revenue and published 550 fewer ad pages. Nothing, apparently, can reverse the publication's death spiral.
• ElleGirl, which was closed, was up nearly 20% in ad pages and 50% in revenue to $19.1 million.
• Martha Stewart Living was up 75% in ad pages (586 vs. 336 last year) and 92% in revenue to $74 million — roughly $35 million more than it pulled in over the same period last year.
  
• The New Yorker is down 17.6% in ad pages (833, over 170 less than last year's first half) and about a 10 percent in revenue ($86.9 million)
• New York ran 15.9% more pages of ads than the first half of 2005, totaling $95.86 million, a 23.9% gain.
• Despite cresting 1,000 issues, Rolling Stone's ad pages were down 12%, though its $90 million in ad revenue is just $2 million off of its 2005 pace.
• Star saw an 11.5% increase in ad pages and 33.6% in revenue, a gain $18 million.
• Vanity Fair was down 11.4% in revenue to $103 million, and down15.3% in ad pages.