Closer added 15.1% in the period, but sales of stablemate Heat were flat despite Emap supporting both titles with TV advertising in the period.
In a crowded market, publishers needed to make big investments in marketing just to maintain their market share, according to Emap Entertainment managing director Louise Matthews.
Sales of IPC's Now were flat period on period, despite discounting three issues from 拢1 to 50p and adding value with themed booklets. Last week, Now launched its first TV ads for 18 months. Editor Jane Ennis believes the celebrity sector has hit a plateau, saying: "We are constantly evolving and enhancing the format, but we're standing still. It's a very saturated market and the bubble may have burst."
Aggressive pricing seems to be having little impact. The cheapest offering, New!, which has cut its price by 10p to 60p, was down 1.4% in the period.
The most recent launch, Star, also from Desmond's stable, didn't submit an ABC, but sales are believed to be below 100,000. Star is now testing a format change from A5 to A4, with a 50p price cut to 拢1.
At the premium-price end, OK! saw a 9.8% drop in its full-price newsstand sales, after deducting 90,000 hea-vily discounted promotional copies.
Hello!'s full-price newsstand sales rose 2.2%.
Magazine End Dec 2003 End Dec 2002 % change
1 Take a Break 1,227,305 1,204,577 1.9
2 Chat 604,582 552,800 9.4
3 That's Life 597,420 597,170 0.0
4 Now 592,076 630,212 -6.1
5 OK! Magazine 570,927 632,791 -9.8
6 Heat 566,731 554,644 2.2
7 Woman 565,393 638,036 -11.4
8 Woman's Own 478,687 519,388 -7.8
9 Woman's Weekly 453,153 486,149 -6.8
10 Bella 429,226 427,885 0.3
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