ACP leads readership in key categories

Highlights of the latest Roy Morgan Research readership survey:

• ACP Magazines publishes Australia’s most-read Monthly, Weekly, Youth, Men’s Lifestyle, Motoring, Women’s Lifestyle and In-flight titles
• Woman’s Day lead over New Idea blows out to over half a million readers
• ACP boasts fastest-growing Food and Fashion titles: recipes+ and Harper’s Bazaar
• Eight ACP titles post 10%+ YOY readership gains. These include: recipes+, Australian House & Garden, Dolly, Good Health, Qantas The Australian Way
• ACP Magazines boosts share of Homemaker category

Market Overview

ACP Magazines has reinforced its position as Australia’s leading magazine publisher in the latest Roy Morgan Readership Survey for the 12 month period ending June 2010.

With principal share and market-leading titles in most categories, ACP Magazines continues to lead the resilience of magazines which as a sector is remarkably stable, with only a 0.3% decrease in gross readership from the March 2010 readership survey.

ACP Magazines’ market share of 46.1% is double that of Pacific Magazines’ 23.0% and almost four times larger than News Magazines’ 12.9% share.

Phil Scott, Group Publishing Director of ACP Magazines, said: “Any growth story is something to be proud of in this highly competitive market. For ACP titles such as recipes+, House & Garden, Qantas, Dolly, and Good Health to achieve double digit percentage growth is simply outstanding. But it isn’t just about finding more readers it’s also about the significant gap between our titles and our competitors. The half a million readers between Woman’s Day and New Idea demonstrates the extent of ACP’s leadership.”

Highlights of the July 2009 – June 2010 Roy Morgan Research Readership survey:

Australia’s #1 Magazine – The Australian Women’s Weekly

• With a monthly readership of 2,188,000 people, The Australian Women’s Weekly reaches more people than any other magazine in the country.
• Up both period-on-period and year-on-year, it celebrates Australian women each month.
• The gap between it and the next two biggest monthly magazines (Better Homes & Gardens and Super Food Ideas) is 321,000 and 1.2 million readers respectively.

Australia’s #1 Weekly Magazine – Woman’s Day

• Reaching more than 2 million readers every week, Woman’s Day dominates the weekly market.
• The readership gap between Woman’s Day and New Idea has blown out by a further 142,000 over the last year to 512,000 readers.
• This is the biggest difference between the two magazines since March 2005. Woman’s Day now has 57.3% share of the category compared to New Idea’s 42.7%.

ACP increases share of the Homemaker category

• All of ACP’s homes magazines are up both period-on-period and year-on-year, outperforming the category and increasing ACP’s category share.
• House & Garden is up 118,000 (22.3%) over the last 12 months, the second biggest absolute readership gain of any magazine. It now reaches 647,000, a three-year high.
• belle is up 8.2% year-on-year and 9.3% period-on-period to now reach 106,000, its highest level since December 2006.
• real living is up 5.1% year-on-year and flat on the period to now reach 123,000 people with each issue.

Australia’s fastest growing Food magazine – recipes+

• Increasing by a huge 108,000 in the past year, recipes+ is the fastest-growing food title in the country and the third fastest of any title, up 33.3% year-on-year
• With readership of 432,000, recipes+ has overtaken Donna Hay and now outreaches it by 61,000 readers.
• All four of ACP’s food titles have increased in readership year on year: recipes+ (+33.3%), Gourmet Traveller Wine (+9.4%), BBC Australian Good Food (+7.1%) and Gourmet Traveller (+3.3%).
• The acquisition of recipes+ has increased ACP’s share of the food category from 17.4% in the year to June 2009 to 29.5% now.

Australia’s #1 Youth Magazine – Dolly

• Dolly’s year on year increase of 13.8%, equating to 47,000 readers, is among the largest of any women’s magazine.
• Now reaching 387,000 people each month, Dolly’s lead over rival Girlfriend has exploded from the narrowest of margins 12 months ago to an impressive 62,000 today.

Australia’s fastest growing magazine period-on-period – Rugby League Week

• The fastest-growing magazine period-on-period is Rugby League Week, up 20.4% since the March 2010 readership survey to now reach 195,000 people.
• Rugby League Week has also increased 9.6% over the last 12 months, extending its lead over Big League to 93,000.
• Rugby League Week is only 9,000 readers shy of doubling Big League’s reach.

Australia’s #1 In-flight Magazine – Qantas The Australian Way

• Adding a massive 41,000 readers in the last 12 months, Qantas The Australian Way proves its market leadership, growing its category share from 44.8% to 48.8%.
• Read by 435,000 people each issue, Qantas has defied the weakening category trend with one of the largest increases of any magazine. Three quarters of new readers are in the Professional or Manager demographics.

Australia’s #1 Men’s Lifestyle Magazine – Zoo

• Zoo remains the country’s most read men’s magazine. Zoo now leads Men’s Health by 79,000 readers.

ACP the leading publisher of Women’s Lifestyle magazines – Cosmopolitan, Cleo and madison

• Buoyed by Cleo’s period on period increase, ACP continues to dominate other publishers in reaching both young and professional women with 70.0% share of the women’s lifestyle category.

ACP the leading publisher of Fashion magazines – Harper’s Bazaar, Shop Til You Drop and Grazia

• Catering to every fashionista’s need, each of ACP’s fashion magazines delivers a unique point of difference that complements the others.
• Led by Harper’s Bazaar’s period-on-period and year-on-year increases, ACP’s fashion trio hold a commanding 48.7% principal share of the category.

ACP the leading publisher of Motoring magazines – TopGear, Wheels, Motor, Street Machine and Unique Cars

• Four of ACP’s six motoring magazines have grown readership year-on-year and ACP has increased its share of the motoring category to 78.2%.
• TopGear posted its 4th consecutive readership increase to an all time high of 448,000 readers.
• TopGear (+3.7% POP, +3.0% YOY), Motor (-1.2% POP, +1.8% YOY) and Unique Cars (+0.8% POP, +0.8% YOY) have performed solidly and counter to the downward trend of most competitor magazines.

Source: Roy Morgan Readership Survey, July 2009 – June 2010

ACP Magazines is Australia’s leading magazine publisher. The company is the magazine arm of leading Australian media and entertainment company, PBL Media. ACP Magazines publishes over 85 titles in Australia which sell nearly 110 million individual copies each year. They include some of the longest-running and most successful mastheads such as The Australian Women’s Weekly, Woman’s Day, Dolly, NW, TV Week, Cleo, Cosmopolitan, Madison, Australian House & Garden, Zoo Weekly and Wheels. ACP Magazines has expanded into nine other countries, including New Zealand and in Asia. It now has a stable of more than 70 international magazines. Integral to the company’s success are vibrant, information-packed reader websites.

For more information, please contact:-

Phil Scott, Publishing Director, ACP Magazines
T: (02) 9282 8000 E: pscott@acpmagazines.com.au

Lynette Phillips, Director of Sales, ACP Magazines
T: (02) 9282 8000 E: lphillips@acpmagazines.com.au

Margaret Fearn, Fearnace Media
T: 61 (0) 402 259 064 E: mfearn@pacific.net.au