Nothing brings people together quite like food, and there are plenty of Cooking & Food publications out there to satisfy everyone’s culinary cravings. Variety is the spice of life, and a vast array of Cooking & Food titles ensures everyone from fine dining fanatics to busy moms looking for fast, family-friendly recipes can find something to tickle their taste buds.

Category leaders Gourmet, Bon Appetit, Saveur and Food & Wine cater to tastes of all sorts, with recipes, ideas for entertaining, food-related travel features and restaurant reviews. These classic titles have earned numerous accolades, including National Magazine Award nods for their enticing features, mouth-watering photography and clean, fresh design. The James Beard Foundation Awards, the “Oscars of the Culinary World,” have also honored these titles for their outstanding contributions to food journalism.

Nutrition-savvy readers will find titles like Weight Watchers, Cooking Light, Eating Well and Light & Tasty to be right up their alleys. Each magazine is packed with good-eating tips, the latest diet and exercise plans, and recipes for delicious, healthy. Diabetic Cooking and Vegetarian Times are two more titles that will please the palates of healthy eaters.

For easy-to-make recipes and kitchen tricks galore, Everyday Food, Simple and Delicious, Cookbook Digest and the award-winning Cook’s Illustrated are all known for being appetite pleasers. The dieticians, personal chefs, and test-kitchen cooks behind these titles test drive recipes, tools and techniques, with the goal of making the best food around.

A relatively new trend in Cooking & Food magazines is the spirits magazine. Wine aficionados will enjoy Wine Spectator, Wine Enthusiast and WineMaker magazines, while Whiskey Magazine and All About Beer focus on making, drinking and pairing other popular spirits.

Last month, it was reported that US News & World Report reduced its frequency from 46 issues to 36 issues. This change will take US News & World Report out of the "news weekly" category.  If it's not a news weekly, what is it? It's hard to define a weekly news magazine that comes out 36 times per year. US News will now be best known for its Best of College annual rankings.

Publisher, Kelly Magill, has announced a new national magazine for women on how to go green.

This quarterly magazine, Positively Green, is interested in “showing women how to live a life that is healthier for themselves and the planet.”

The magazine is printed on paper with recycled content, and each issue will “highlight a variety of green topics in a way that educates, entertains, and provides a visual feast.” It plans to reduce the research of the reader, and will feature products that are the best solutions to the problems.

Positively Green is planning a launch party in July to be hosted by Ed and Rachelle Begley. Rachelle will appear on the cover of the first issue, which will hit stores in August.

We are always on the lookout for new and innovative magazine and this fits the bill. Here's to a successful launch!

 

Planet Out Inc. sells Out magazine and Advocate for $6,000,000!

An article in Folio magazine reports that Planet Out was riddled with debt. In fact, Planet Out lost $51.2 million in 2007.

Planet Out acquired Advocate magazine and Out magazine from LPI Media in 2005 for $24 million in cash plus $7 million in debt. My math is not the greatest, but it seems like quite a loss.

Advocate is probably one of the top gay magazines for news. It was started 1967! This is venerable brand that can surely become a cash cow. Just gotta sell those ad pages!

Advovate has circulation of more than 170,000 and Out has circulation of more than 178,000.

These titles probably need some strong business support because we've got to imagine that each title has a loyal following.

We hope to share some insight about the magazine business. This blog will be written for people who love magazines and the magazine business.

Check back to see how this turns out!