Portfolio accomplishes upscale advertising goal

Irin Carmon and Stephanie Smith of Women’s Wear Daily write that the first issue of new business magazine Conde Nast Portfolio achieves the parent company’s stated goal of attracting a more upscale audience to the glossy than other business magazines.

They wrote, “The original goal of attracting more business and financial advertisers to Condé Nast’s fashion and luxury ad base appears to have been met, in the launch issue, at least: Of the 53 business advertisers appearing in the debut issue, 20 were new to the company and another 10 had run in just one Condé Nast title in the last two years, primarily in titles like Wired and Golf Digest.

“The final ad page balance is a roughly 50-50 mix of endemic financial and business advertising with luxury, travel and automotive brands. Among the advertisers are Accenture, BMW, De Beers, Grey Goose, Prudential and Credit Suisse. Half the 10 Web sponsors of portfolio.com are financial advertisers. The first five spreads of the magazine are designated for business brands, to convey Portfolio’s identity as a business title, said vice president and group publisher David Carey. Ralph Lauren appears as the first luxury brand, with a three-page unit surrounding Lipman’s editor’s letter. The 32 remaining fashion and luxury advertisers in the first issue include Burberry, Ermenegildo Zegna, Patek Philippe and Rolex. The open page rate for a four-color, four-page ad is $34,200.

“Though Portfolio cuts a wide swath with advertisers, Carey sees room for improvement in the automotive and travel categories. Still, Lexus bought 10 pages in the premiere issue to launch its new branding campaign, Cadillac bought the back cover and the premiere issue carries ads from Flexjet, British Airways and Loews Hotels.”

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