Newsweek brought back in print as a "luxury product"

When the deep pockets and big brains of the business couldn't manage to keep Newsweek publishing, somehow a couple of audacious online publishers -- much to their surprise -- are bringing it back (at least in a small way) in print. 

According to a story in the New York Times, IBT Media bought Newsweek's assets at fire sale prices with the goal of publishing the newsweekly wholly on the web. They tripled Newsweek's online traffic and surprised themselves by coming to the conclusion that they could put out a hard copy edition and make it pay.

“We had no real plans to bring it back into print,” Jim Impoco, Newsweek’s editor in chief, said during a recent interview at the company’s headquarters in Lower Manhattan. “We called it the p-word.”

But Etienne Uzac, 30, and Johnathan Davis, 31 say that reader demand made them consider print. They plan to put 70,000 copies on the newsstand (a far cry from its circulation of 3.3 million 20 years ago) and sell them for $7.99 each (like The New Yorker).

“You would pay only if you don’t want to read anything on a backlit screen,” Mr. Uzac said. “It is a luxury product.”

Related stories:

•  Newsweek sails into an all-digital future; ends print edition
• Newsweek days in print are numbered; may go online-only this fall