Consumer magazines are bought by the general public for information and/or entertainment. SRDS divides 2,700 domestic consumer magazines into 75 classifications, among them general editorial, sports, travel, and women’s. Another way of classifying consumer magazines is by distribution: They can be sold through subscription or circulation, store distribution, or both. Time and Newsweek are sold both through subscription and in stores; Woman’s World is sold only through stores. People magazine was originally sold only through stores but then added subscription sales as it gained in popularity. Magazines can also be classified by frequency; weekly, monthly, and bimonthly are the most common.
Consumer magazines represent the major portion of the magazine industry, accounting for nearly two-thirds of all advertising dollars spent in magazines. Consumer magazines are best suited to marketers interested in reaching general consumers of products and services as well as to companies trying to reach a specific target market. The most frequently advertised categories in consumer magazines are automotive, direct response, toiletries and cosmetics, computers, office equipment and stationery, and business and consumer services. Marketers of tobacco products spend much of their media budget in magazines, since they are prohibited from advertising in the broadcast media.
While large national advertisers tend to dominate consumer magazine advertising in terms of expenditures, more than 2,000 consumer magazines are also important to smaller companies selling products that appeal to specialized markets. Specialinterest magazines assemble consumers with similar lifestyles or interests and offer marketers an efficient way to reach these people with little wasted coverage or circulation. For example, a manufacturer of ski or snowboarding equipment such as Nordica, Rossignol, or Salomon might find Powder the best vehicle for advertising to skiers or snowboarders.
Not only are these specialty magazines of value to firms interested in reaching a specific market segment, but their editorial content often creates a very favorable advertising environment for relevant products and services. For example, avid skiers and snowboarders cannot wait for the first snowfall after reading the season’s first issues of Snowboarding or Powder magazine and may be quite receptive to the ads they carry for skiing and snowboarding products and destination ski resorts.