Magazine Industry

In today's lesson we were taught about the different magazine industries across Europe. The main publishing company we learnt about was one of the largest in Europe which is known as Bauer. It is an extremely powerful publishing company as it is well known globally and since the company was founded in 1875, it has been privately-owned and under management by the Bauer Family of four generations. The company have been producing and distributing numerous popular magazines having stakes in television and also radio, but has recently completed the purchase of a consumer magazine division and radio station division of the British company, Emap.

The publishing company initially started in 1987 with Bella magazine which made a huge impact on the women's market across the country. They started off in the Germany and are now based in Hamburg as a small printing house publishing company into a worldwide publishing empire comprising of 238 magazines and publish in 15 countries which include: U.K, Germany, France, Spain, USA, Austria, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Hungary, Czech Republic, Mexico, Slovakia, Russia, and China. They have 6,600 employees worldwide and an annual turnover of 1.79 billion Euros. The worldwide circulation of the Bauer Media Group's magazine titles amount to around 38 million magazines each week.

The company own a variety of magazines consisting of different genres, they own numerous women's weekly magazines which include:

• Closer


• Bella


• Heat


• Take a Break


• Grazia


• That's Life!


• Spirit & Destiny

As well as women's magazine Bauer also own various music, film, men's and TV magazines including:

• Mojo


• Kerrang!


• Q


• Empire


• Zoo


• FHM


• TV- TV Listing


• Magic TV


• The Box


• Smash Hits TV


• 4Music


• Kiss TV

The examples of the magazines are just a minor selection of the publications the Bauer company own, which initially shows how important and popular the company are within the media industry as they are well known globally. The company mainly advertise their magazines towards a majority of the female audience as a third of women are readers of Bauer titles. The magazines are mainly targeted towards an audience within the category of A, B and C1, showing that the company are successful within the media industry as they provide a variety of magazines to target a wide range of readers whilst also targeting the stories towards nearly everyone's interests. The significance of the magazines published is that they are read more in today's modern society which enable online campaigns and also drives the word of mouth between people.