Bella Ups Celebrity Content To Boost Sales

Bella, the H Bauer owned women’s weekly magazine, is to extend its celebrity coverage in a bid to boost declining circulation.

The move is in order to boost the title’s appeal to its target demographic of women in their mid-30s.

At the most recent ABCs, Bella recorded a significant real term decline, of nearly 30% or a little under 95,000 copies year on year. Period on period this was an almost 10.5%, taking its total to 221,661.

The main celebrity-focused titles remained popular, despite some declines. Heat reported a fall of 11% year on year, and 4.5% period on period. This leaves its total at around 533,000 copies, compared to Hello!‘s 405,615 following a 2% year on year fall.

However, OK! bucked the trend, adding 9.5% to its total year on year, and almost 23% period on period. The magazine’s total ABC for July to December 2007 stands at 683,451 (see ABC Results Jul-Dec 2007: Women’s Weeklies See Sizeable Declines With Few Bucking The Trend).

H Bauer appointed Julia Davis, former deputy editor of OK!, as editor of Bella in January (see Bauer Appoints New Bella Editor), and this is the first major move for the title since she was appointed.

The magazine will no longer solely focus on A-list Hollywood celebrities, but will now feature what it termed “aspirational stars”, such as Jordan and Kerry Katona.

Bella underwent a major redesign in March last year, with a greater emphasis on celebrity content, to reposition itself for younger readers.

However, the latest ABC figures suggest the overhaul was greeted with a lukewarm reception by readers.

H Bauer Publishing: 020 7241 8000 www.bauer.co.uk