Two competing magazines about depression to launch next year

Two, competing magazines about depression are scheduled to be launched in 2008.

It has been announced by publisher Bill McPhee that Magpie Publishing Inc. of Fort Erie, Ontario will launch Anchor in 2008 (no date specified).

The announcement about Anchor is that it will be coincident with the launch next year of a magazine called Esperanza, also serving the community of interest surrounding depression. It's to be published starting in mid-February by Joanne Doan, who until recently was a 50:50 partner with McPhee in SZ and another property, BP, a largely U.S.-based magazine about bipolar disorder.

Magpie has published Schizophrenia Digest in both a U.S. and Canadian edition since 1994.

Doan had been instrumental in selling pharmaceutical company advertising in all the properties and had helped launch the U.S. edition of Schizophrenia Digest in 2003 and was masthead publisher when BP was launched in 2006. Her company is now based in Buffalo.

A partnership disagreement led to Doan striking off on her own last April (though continuing to manage sales for Schizophrenia Digest through to the fall of 2007) and taking ownership of BP, while McPhee retained ownership of Schizophrenia Digest. Doan then announced the launch of Esperanza. And now, six months later, McPhee has announced the launch of a direct competitor.

Both say their new depression magazines will have U.S. and Canadian circulation, though there are no figures yet available.