Womens’ Weekly Magazine Market Report
Circulation and readership figures for the latest periods are now available, and afford an opportunity to look at the individual and collective fortunes of the Women’s Weeklies (the ‘mature market’, excluding teenage titles).
ABC data excludes Bauer’s two titles, which according to their own audited figures are currently the market leaders in this field.
Only ‘Hello’ (ABC up 25.9%) and ‘Take A Break’ (Audited figure up 20.4%) show increased sales year-on-year. M’TEL AUDITED 6MONTH CIRC.COMPARISONS
| TOTAL | JA-J91 | JA-J92 | %CH |
|---|---|---|---|
| BELLA (Aud) | 1201 | 1369 | 14 |
| BEST | 680 | 631 | -7.2 |
| CHAT | 568 | 516 | -9.2 |
| HELLO | 360 | 454 | 25.9 |
| LADY | 67 | 0 | |
| ME | 635 | 511 | -19.4 |
| MY WEEKLY | 478 | 450 | -6 |
| P.FRIEND | 502 | 480 | -4.5 |
| TAKE A BREAK(Aud) | 1137 | 1161 | 2.1 |
| WOMAN | 762 | 695 | -8.7 |
| WOMANS OWN | 782 | 714 | -8.7 |
| WOMANS REALM | 460 | 404 | -12.3 |
| WOMANS WEEKLY | 994 | 864 | -13 |
| TOTAL IN 000’s | 8626 | 8249 | -4.4 |
Charting circulation trends from the time at which Gruner & Jahr entered the market the main feature is the virtually uninterrupted sales decline of most titles. G&J’s ‘Best’ is down 36.5% over the period and the IPC ‘Big 4’ is down 33% in total. ‘Chat’ has fallen, risen and appears to be falling again. DC Thomson’s two titles have lost early 20% in sales; ‘Me’ has stormed in at one million plus and petered out to half that figure. A positive feature is ‘Hello’ which built steadily from an unremarkable base.
However, the major development is Bauer’s arrival in the market, based on initially low cover prices (now 46p each incidentally, compared with 50p for ‘Best’). Taking their audited figures into account the total market has actually grown by 18% since ‘Bests’ first published sales (Jul-Dec 1987). (see following chart) Audited 6 Month Circulation Trends
| BELLA | BEST | CHAT | HELLO | LADY | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| JLD87 | – | 994 | 515 | – | 63 |
| JAJ88 | – | 987 | 488 | – | 64 |
| JLD88 | – | 960 | 468 | – | 60 |
| JAJ89 | – | 886 | 417 | 180 | 62 |
| JLD89 | – | 832 | 333 | 241 | 60 |
| JAJ90 | – | 792 | 474 | 263 | 64 |
| JLD90 | 1191 | 679 | 611 | 347 | 62 |
| JAJ91 | 1202 | 680 | 568 | 360 | 67 |
| JLD91 | 1202 | 658 | 557 | 444 | 62 |
| JAJ92 | 1369 | 631 | 516 | 454 | – |
| ME | MY | PEOPLES | TAKE/ | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| WKLY | FRIEND | BREAK | WOMAN | ||
| JLD87 | – | 585 | 573 | – | 1047 |
| JAJ88 | – | 539 | 567 | – | 986 |
| JLD88 | – | 516 | 540 | – | 928 |
| JAJ89 | – | 506 | 538 | – | 887 |
| JLD89 | 1054 | 500 | 529 | – | 856 |
| JAJ90 | 872 | 496 | 519 | – | 858 |
| JLD90 | 733 | 474 | 499 9 | 23 | 806 |
| JAJ91 | 635 | 478 | 502 11 | 37 | 762 |
| JLD91 | 595 | 472 | 497 13 | 7 | 717 |
| JAJ92 | 511 | 450 | 480 11 | 60 | 695 |
| W’MAN | W’MAN | W’MAN | TOTAL | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| OWN | REALM | WKLY | ||
| JLD87 | 1083 | 606 | 1269 | 6735 |
| JAJ88 | 1025 | 598 | 1240 | 6493 |
| JLD88 | 968 | 554 | 117 | 6173 |
| JAJ89 | 931 | 542 | 1197 | 6145 |
| JLD89 | 902 | 529 | 1104 | 6976 |
| JAJ90 | 890 | 510 | 1129 | 6866 |
| JLD90 | 830 | 483 | 1067 | 8705 |
| JAJ91 | 782 | 460 | 994 | 8628 |
| JLD91 | 731 | 455 | 905 | 8602 |
| JAJ92 | 714 | 404 | 864 | 8248 |
Total Readership figures indicate a marketplace that showed buoyant total increases until this very latest period. Taking ‘Best’s’ first figures as the benchmark again, the market increased by 49% to the end of 1991, but has fallen back by 14 percentage points with the most recent NRS data. Audited 6 Month Readership Trends
| BELLA | BEST | CHAT | HELLO | LADY | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| JAJ88 | – | 1957 | 1288 | – | – |
| JLD88 | 3442 | 2382 | 1166 | 252 | – |
| JAJ89 | 3613 | 2461 | 965 | 214 | – |
| JLD89 | 3665 | 2385 | 910 | 286 | – |
| JAJ90 | 3512 | 2397 | 1141 | 443 | – |
| JLD90 | 3606 | 2599 | 1771 | 629 | – |
| JAJ91 | 3582 | 2365 | 1662 | 894 | 316 |
| JLD91 | 3584 | 2437 | 1591 | 1010 | – |
| JAJ92 | 3176 | 2167 | 1436 | 1044 | – |
| MY | PEOPLES | TAKE/ | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| ME | WKLY | FRIEND | BREAK | WOMAN | |
| JAJ88 | – | 1551 | 1386 | – | 2993 |
| JLD88 | – | 1503 | 1336 | – | 2902 |
| JAJ89 | – | 1476 | 1292 | – | 2810 |
| JLD89 | 1872 | 1440 | 1321 | – | 2625 |
| JAJ90 | 1663 | 1525 | 1354 | – | 2500 |
| JLD90 | 1753 | 1484 | 1508 | 1501 | 2806 |
| JAJ91 | 1405 | 1438 | 1481 | 2261 | 2680 |
| JLD91 | 1483 | 1578 | 1442 | 2728 | 2702 |
| JAJ92 | 1191 | 1457 | 1207 | 2734 | 2498 |
| WOMANS | WOMANS | WOMANS | TOTAL | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| OWN | REALM | WEEKLY | 000’s | |
| JAJ88 | 4002 | 1776 | 2781 | 17734 |
| JLD88 | 3972 | 1517 | 2708 | 21180 |
| JAJ89 | 4006 | 1593 | 2772 | 21202 |
| JLD89 | 3775 | 1590 | 2838 | 22707 |
| JAJ90 | 3506 | 1423 | 2681 | 22145 |
| JLD90 | 3745 | 1529 | 2664 | 25595 |
| JAJ91 | 3720 | 1488 | 2408 | 25700 |
| JLD91 | 3767 | 1558 | 2501 | 26381 |
| JAJ92 | 3405 | 1267 | 2327 | 23909 |
Publishers’ market share has also fluctuated as the figures below show. Total Rdrship % Share 000’s IPC/DCT/G&J/Bauer/Hello/Oth JAJ87 17400 74 18 – – – 7 (IPC Big 4,Chat + DC Thomson)
JAJ88 17734 65 17 11 – – 7 (Best’s First Data)
JLD90 25595 49 12 10 20 2 7 (Me + Bella + Hello up & running; Take A Break’s First Data)
JAJ92 23909 51 11 9 25 4 – (IPC includes Chat now)