Natmags Merges Baby Titles

The National Magazine Company (Natmags) has announced that it is to merge two of its baby titles, Good Housekeeping’s Having A Baby and Prima Baby. The brand name Prima Baby will be retained as the title of the magazine, as it has been deemed the longer established of the two, and is also associated with the Prima Baby Show, now in its third year.

Natmags added the second baby title to its portfolio with the acquisition of Gruner & Jahr’s assets in July (see NatMags Grabs Gruner and Jahr). Natmags gave a previous attempt at a parenting title, M, the chop last year (see Natmags Gives Parenting Magazine The Chop), saying, “Unfortunately, the parenting magazine market has not developed at the rate we had hoped.” It was a further review of the market which has brought the company to this decision.

The baby and childbirth magazine market is dominated by Emma’s Diary Pregnancy Guide, a free title, published on behalf of the Royal College of General Practitioners. This reaches 75% of UK expectant mothers, a circulation of 397,000 in the latest ABC audit. Among the paid-for titles (see above), Emap’s Mother & Baby currently achieves the highest circulation, with 83,000. At present Prima Baby has the next highest circulation, with 57,500, but if it retains the readers of Having a Baby, estimated by the publishers to number 53,000, it could overtake the field.

Natmags has stated that no redundancies are expected as a result of this decision. Deputy managing director Duncan Edwards added that this should signal the end of the restructuring which has resulted from the Gruner & Jahr acquisition (see Natmags Announces New Brands-Oriented Structure).

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