ABCs: Zoo’s fall continues
The decline of men’s magazine Zoo Weekly has gathered pace, the latest set of Audit Bureau of Circulations data suggests.
The ACP Magazines title fared worst of all of the audit weekly titles, with a decline in the first three months of the year of 29.1% to 65,632,
The fall reflects the poor state of the men’s magazines sector. ACP closed FHM in March, a month after it posted a 50% sales drop. News Limited axed Alpha magazine last year and ACP closed Ralph.
ACP boss Matt Stanton has warned that other closures will follow.
Faring just as badly as Zoo Weekly were ACP’s soft porn titles People – down 30,7% to 40,199 – and Picture, down 29% to 37,663.
ACP’s TV Week – organiser of The Logies – also took a hit, down 10.5% to 167,540.
Just two weekly titles saw circulation growth. ACP’s OK! was up 2.7% to 99,877 and Pacific Magazines’ Who was up 0.5% to 132,289.
Stanton said in a statement: “Retail trading conditions remain challenging and in context Australia’s weekly magazine sales have proved resilient, declining just 1.7% in the three months to March compared to the previous period.
“It’s also important to remember that the extensive reader interactions across ACP’s growing digital portfolio are not yet reflected in the audit figures.
“ACP magazine websites are visited by an average of 5,881,777 Unique Browsers per month, generating an average of 60,960,701 Page Views per month.”
Tim Burrowes founded Mumbrella in 2008. He worked on Mumbrella until 2021. At various points he was editor, content director and editor-at-large.
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As a fan of men’s mags, ZOO is just dire. Employ some funny writers with a brain, spend some money on your talent shoots and sack your art director (it looks a total mess) and you might be in with a small chance of not being ACP’s next closure.
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The decline is sales probably has to do with the decline in quality. The Zoo now is a far cry from what it was when it launched.
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I have no figures to back it up but I don’t think its “rocket surgery” to figure out the drop in men’s magazine sales. The dual challenges of audience change (20 something aren’t into bogan publications, older folks realise being a “lad” is a tad undignified around when they get kids) and the fact that charging for smut in the internet age doesn’t make sense.
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Couldn’t have happened to a nicer magazine.
Simon
http://www.TwoCentsGroup.com.au
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The Brasillian Twins issue a few weeks ago was epic though. God damn they were sizzlers.
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@Sizzlers. I know! How good was the brazilian issue! – that musnt have been counted in the circ figures as that would have sold out. They were roasting!
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Internet enabled smartphone penetration increases as soft-porn magazine circulations fall. Now if only I could connect the dots…
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Relaunch ZOO as a street press.
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