View all newsletters
Sign up for our free email newsletters

Fighting for quality news media in the digital age.

  1. Archive content
July 25, 2008

End of the story for book-trade magazine

By Rachael Gallagher

Weekly magazine for the book trade, Publishing News, has closed, blaming the drastic drop in print advertising from book publishers.

Eight jobs will be lost, which the mag’s owner Fred Newman said would be mostly journalists.

Newman, who founded the title in 1979, said it relied heavily on print advertising from book publishers targeting booksellers, who now have many alternative ways to reach their target audience, including online and supermarkets.

PN Ltd continues as a business and will carry on running the Galaxy British Book Awards and the Christmas Books Catalogue, which while profit-making, are no enough to sustain a magazine, Newman said.

‘This is not a sudden, overnight thing. We lived in hope that Publishing News would recover but it’s clear that this is a trend that isn’t going to be reversed.

‘Newspapers and magazines in general have been suffering from a drop in advertising; that’s been common to all the printed media.”

Neill Denny, editor-in-chief of Publishing News’ rival title the Bookseller, agreed with Newman, and said that there had been an ‘acute’problem in book publishing, meaning less print advertising is available. He said that in addition to advertising moving online there were a number of factors that set the book-publishing trade press aside from other B2B titles.

Content from our partners
MHP Group's 30 To Watch awards for young journalists open for entries
How PA Media is helping newspapers make the digital transition
Publishing on the open web is broken, how generative AI could help fix it

‘There has been a structural change in publishing that may not have been replicated in other industries,’he said. ‘Publishers have merged together, meaning [there are] fewer medium-sized publishers than there used to be.

‘Retailers are demanding money from the publishers to stock books in the shops, And in the mid-Nineties the net book agreement [price maintenance for books] ended – so the way that books are sold has changed.”

Denny also argued that the closure of Publishing News is not bad news for other B2B titles. ‘If you look at the overall size of the business press compared with 10 years ago it’s a lot bigger and there’s certainly more titles.

‘I think you could make a strong case that across the whole printed media B2B is the only successful sector at the moment, or has been over the past decade.’

Publishing News declined to reveal its circulation, which was paid-for, and was believed to be in the low thousands.

Email pged@pressgazette.co.uk to point out mistakes, provide story tips or send in a letter for publication on our "Letters Page" blog

Select and enter your email address Weekly insight into the big strategic issues affecting the future of the news industry. Essential reading for media leaders every Thursday. Your morning brew of news about the world of news from Press Gazette and elsewhere in the media. Sent at around 10am UK time. Our weekly does of strategic insight about the future of news media aimed at US readers. A fortnightly update from the front-line of news and advertising. Aimed at marketers and those involved in the advertising industry.
  • Business owner/co-owner
  • CEO
  • COO
  • CFO
  • CTO
  • Chairperson
  • Non-Exec Director
  • Other C-Suite
  • Managing Director
  • President/Partner
  • Senior Executive/SVP or Corporate VP or equivalent
  • Director or equivalent
  • Group or Senior Manager
  • Head of Department/Function
  • Manager
  • Non-manager
  • Retired
  • Other
Visit our privacy Policy for more information about our services, how New Statesman Media Group may use, process and share your personal data, including information on your rights in respect of your personal data and how you can unsubscribe from future marketing communications.
Thank you

Thanks for subscribing.

Websites in our network