Conde Nast Cutting Back on 2 Magazines

Richard Perez-Pena - International Herald Tribune

Conde Nast Publications will reduce the number of issues it publishes of two of its newer magazines, Portfolio and Men's Vogue, and will cut budgets across the company by 5 percent, company executives said on Thursday, as the belt-tightening in the industry reaches even the publisher of high-end products like Vanity Fair and The New Yorker.

Portfolio, a business magazine, will publish 10 times a year, instead of 12, and Men's Vogue from 10 times a year to twice, said the executives, who were granted anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the changes, which have not yet been announced. In addition, some of Portfolio's online operations, including advertising sales, will be folded into those of Wired magazine.

The magazine industry has seen a sharp decline in advertising revenue this year. The luxury product advertising on which Conde Nast relies has held up better than most types, but even that has declined, and is expected to fall farther with the steep drop in stock prices.

Portfolio was introduced last year with much fanfare, the company's first business magazine and its most expensive new project in years, and executives at Conde Nast said it was willing to lose more than $100 million on Portfolio. It had average circulation of 415,000 in the first half of this year, a healthy figure for a new magazine. But it has also been roiled by internal disputes and high staff turnover.

Much of the operation of Men's Vogue, started in 2006, will be folded into Vogue, one of the company's flagship magazines. Men's Vogue has circulation of almost 370,000.

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