- Conde Nast has decided to reduce the frequency of its male health title, GQ Active, to four times a year and will package it with sister title GQ.
Launched in May last year, GQ Active has been published ten times a year and registered a circulation figure of 65,069 at the last round of Audit Bureau of Circulation six monthly figure (to June 1998). This was slightly below original expectations of around 70,000, which were quoted at launch.
However, Nicholas Coleridge, managing director of Conde Nast, was bullish about GQ Active's market position.
"I think it's a way of making more impact and more money," he said. "It will be run as a separate magazine with a totally separate team and banded to GQ four times a year. At the same time pagination is being increased."
He said that there were no plans to fold the magazine into a section within GQ, which was where it had originated from, and said that there was a publishing programme in place for the title until the end of 2000. Next year the title will come out in February, April, July and November.
Following the change in frequency, three people have been made redundant and two have moved to other titles. Simon Mills, the magazine's editor has gone freelance but remains a contributing editor, while deputy editor Simon Tiffin takes up the editor's seat.
The men's health and fitness market is led by Rodale Press's Men's Health magazine, which chalked up a circulation increase of almost 31 per cent year on year to 245,659 in the six months to June 1998.
The National Magazine Company is gearing up to launch into the market with Zest for Men on 19 October. Zest for Men is to be marketed as an alternative to all the existing magazines in the men's health and fitness market, appealing to ABC1 25 to 38 year old men who have busy lives and want to eat and live well without becoming obsessive.
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