Media Life Magazine reporter Diego Vasquez talks with The Reaper, the magazine industry insider who runs the web site MagazineDeathPool.com, to get a rundown on what magazine might next close in the wake of the Time Inc. decision to shutter Business 2.0.
The Reaper has Kiplinger’s Personal Finance and Conde Nast Portfolio on his death watch.
About Kiplinger’s, The Reaper said, “Personal finance is one of the toughest categories to be in during the internet age. Kiplinger’s not only is the No. 3 title, which is not a great place to be in these days, but they fired their whole sales staff and replaced them with sales rep agencies. They have the oldest audience, and it’s getting smaller and smaller. Kiplinger’s is becoming less and less essential. And they have no real digital strategy in place, which the other two titles (Money, SmartMoney) do.”
In regards to Portfolio, The Reaper stated, “Portfolio is a larger, more expensive version of Cargo. Nobody asked for it, but Condé Nast believes advertisers will. Readers have not demanded a new business magazine at a time when magazines are already in trouble and there’ve been too many of them. Condé Nast does not have it in its DNA to do anything humbly. I think Portfolio is a curiosity piece and once the bloom is off the rose, the newsstand sales will eventually tell the tale.
>”Like Cargo, Portfolio will not catch on with readers in the long run. Advertisers will eventually detect that there is no reader commitment or desire, and it will eventually fold.”
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