Emap Launches Grazia As UK’s First Weekly Glossy
Emap has today announced plans to launch the UK’s first weekly glossy for women in an attempt to replicate the success enjoyed by Zoo in the men’s market.
The publisher of Heat, Closer and FHM is gearing up the launch of a British version of upmarket Italian magazine, Grazia, with a budget of more than £16 million over the next three years.
The title is intended to transform the burgeoning women’s glossy market, currently dominated by monthlies Glamour and Cosmopolitan, by offering readers a mix of fashion, celebrity gossip and style on a weekly basis.
Grazia will hit the news-stands next spring and will aim to achieve a circulation of 150,000 within the first twelve months. The title’s launch budget is intended to keep it afloat until it reaches breakeven within three years.
Commenting on the initiative, Emap chief executive, Paul Keenan, said: “From Spring 2005 women won’t have to wait a whole month for their glossy fix. For those who need to know what’s hot right now in fashion and life in general – Grazia will be both gorgeous and compelling.”
He added: “What we are doing here is important because it is innovative and bold. It will grow the market and bring something new to readers and advertisers. Grazia will be a key part of Emap Consumer Media’s women’s magazine portfolio, complementing Heat, Closer, New Woman, Top Sante and more.”
Emap has signed a 30-year deal to produce Grazia in the UK under licence from Italian publisher Mondadori. The British launch team will be headed by former FHM editor David Davis in the position of managing director and ex-Elle editor Fiona McIntosh in the role of editor in chief.
Aimed at upmarket 25 to 45 year-old women, Grazia has been hugely successful since its launch on the Continent in 1938. It is currently Italy’s biggest selling weekly title with a mix of news, fashion and lifestyle helping it to an impressive weekly circulation of 245,000.
However, the UK women’s glossy market is a notoriously hard nut to crack with established titles such as Hachette Filipacchi’s style-focused Elle and Red already commanding a tight grip on older women in the high-spending ABC1 social bracket.
Similar concerns over market saturation were raised when Emap’s Zoo and IPC’s Nuts launched as the first weekly lifestyle magazines for men earlier this year. Both titles have go one to defy their critics with Zoo recording an initial circulation of 200,125 and Nuts entering the sector just below market leading FHM (see ABC Results Jan-Jun 2004: Men’s Weeklies Make Their Mark).
Emap: 01733 568 900 www.emap.co.uk
Recent Magazine Stories from NewsLine Emap Creates International Sales Team For FHM Desmond Gears Up For Launch Of New Women’s Glossy Sugar Appoints New Editor Ahead Of Redesign
Subscribers can access ten years of media news and analysis in the Archive