Media

Saturday, 12 October 2013

Current Brands Owned by IPC Media

IPC Media Research Company History

Research on IPC Media

IPC Media is an international publishing corporation formed in 1963, it formed following the merge of the UK's three leading magazine publishers - George Newnes, Odhams Press and Fleetway Publications - who came together with the Mirror Group to form the International Publishing Corporation (IPC). And IPC Magazines was created five years later, in 1968.

But those three original magazine businesses each had their own respected history, having been established in 1881, 1890 and 1880, with a number of the titles they launched in the late 19th Century still being published today under the IPC umbrella.

Magazines of the 1800's

'The Field', launched in 1853 and within a year became the largest newspaper in Europe, with 24 pages. It was aimed at those who enjoyed Britain's countryside and whom where dedicated to shooting, hunting and fishing.It had its own correspondent throughout the Crimean War and its November 18, 1854 issue ran a series of personal narratives of those who took part in the Charge of the Light Brigade. Eight further IPC titles that are still thriving today were launched in the late 1800s: Country Life, Horse & Hound, Shooting Times, Yachting World , Amateur Gardening , Cycling Week, Amateur Photography and The Railway Magazine.Competitions played a key role in sales promotions for all early IPC titles, one of the competitions consisted of £1 a week for life to any reader who could guess the amount of gold and silver in the Bank of England on a given date.

Magazines of the early 1900's

The new century saw the arrival of three titles set to become part of IPC Media many years later Yachting Monthly, Cage Birds and Motor Boat. The first of IPC's four traditional women's weeklies, Woman's Weekly, launched in November 1911 under the editorial banner "our motto - practical and useful". The same year, golfers north of the border got the first copies of their own new title, Golf Monthly. Homes & Gardens became one of the first magazines to be published after the First World War. Its early issues were distinctly down to earth, with features ranging from how to 'Wash at home with a machine', to the shrewd idea of 'combining the kitchen with the scullery'.

The 1920s
Odhams launched the new monthly Ideal Home in opposition to Newnes' Homes & Gardens. Its first editor, Captain GC Clarke, wanted it to strive against "the erection of hideous houses which go to mar the beauty of what would under any other circumstances be the most ideal and beautiful environment," referring to the government's promise in 1921 to build 100,000 houses as part of its post-war planning. Woman&Home entered the market in 1926, and by its third birthday in 1929 had grown to a steady 144 pages, majoring on fiction.

The 1930s
The 1932 launch of Woman's Own heralded the arrival of one of IPC's traditional 'Big Two', with the appearance of Woman following just five years later. Newnes promoted its first issue of Woman's Own with a free cover-mounted gift - three skeins of wool with every copy! The first issue of Woman in 1937 cost 2d and was the first full-colour magazine at that price. Other titles launched in this decade included Caravan, Stamp Magazine and Prediction.

The 1940s
A key wartime role was played by IPC's women's weeklies, keeping up the morale of Britain's women and supplying an essential information service on behalf of the Government. Many of the Woman covers from the wartime years are regarded as classic works of art in their own right, while wartime Woman's Own covers played their own part in rallying women to the wartime cause.

The 1950s
The upsurge in the music scene heralded the arrival of New Musical Express in 1952. Launched amidst the heady days of Radio Luxembourg, NME set the ball rolling with its compilation of the first official UK record chart - topping that bill as Britain's very first number one was Al Martino's Here In My Heart. Following the arrival of ITV in 1955, TVTimes, operating out of a tiny office in High Holborn, published its first issue - in black & white - covering the new commercial stations. The cover stars were Lucille Ball and Patricia Dainton, star of the 15-minute daily soap opera, Sixpenny Corner. Originally published by the ITV companies, TVTimes was acquired by IPC in 1989 in the run-up to the deregulation of the TV listings market.

The 1960s
Life for magazine staff would never be the same again following the 1963 formation of the International Publishing Corporation, bringing together the three rival magazine companies, Newnes, Fleetway and Odhams Press. Traditional competitors found themselves all working for the same parent company - Ideal Home andHomes & Gardens, Woman and Woman's Own, to name but a few. 1969 saw the birth of a new football weekly - Shoot!* - launched to capitalise on the upsurge of interest in the game generated by England's World Cup victory three years earlier. Other IPC titles making their debut in the Swinging Sixties included Rugby World, World Soccer, Angler's Mailand Family Circle*.

The 1970s
The Reed Group acquires IPC in 1970 to form the giant global corporation, Reed International. IPC welcomed the Queen and Duke of Edinburgh to its King's Reach Tower HQ. HRH drops in on Horse & Hound, Country Life, Woman and Woman's Own, while Prince Philip makes a solo visit to Angler's Mail andYachting Monthly. Not a lot of people know it, but IPC was at the forefront of the pre-recorded video market with the formation of the IPC video division in 1976. One notable early launch was the home video of Joan Collins' The Stud. Succesful launches included Aeroplane Monthly*, Sporting Gun and SuperBike*.

The 1980s
IPC announces the formation of European Magazines Ltd., a joint venture company with Groupe Marie Claire to launch the UK edition of the international title Marie Claire in 1988. In a scheme to encourage and honour editorial excellence within the company, the IPC Editorial Awards are introduced, now a key event in the company calendar. IPC embarks upon the biggest sales campaign in its history, spearheaded by 21 of its top editors - the first ad features 'Four of Britain's Most Influential People' - the editors of its women's weeklies. The launch issue of Essentials is a sell-out, and after just six issues launches in France as Avantages, in conjunction with Groupe Marie Claire. Other new IPC titles on the newstand include 4x4*, Eventing, Chat, Mizz*, Motor Caravan Magazine*, Wedding & Home*, Country Homes & Interiors, Classic Boat*, Model Collector*, Motor Boats Monthly, Practical Parenting*, VolksWorld and Bird Keeper*.

The 1990s
With the deregulation of the TV listings market, What's on TV makes its triumphant entrance onto the scene in 1991. In the face of fierce competition, it goes on to become the UK's best-seling magazine, a position it still enjoys today. In one of the most dramatic arrivals in publishing history, revolutionary lads title Loaded* hits the newsstands in 1994. Hailed as the outstanding launch of recent years, it spawns countless clones and opens up the whole young men's market. The women's weeklies go into overdrive, with IPC acquiring Here! from Gruner & Jahr and merging it intoNow, launched in 1996. NME becomes the first major UK music title to get its own internet site - nme.com - destined to go on to become Europe's most popular music website. IPC Magazines is sold to Cinven for £860m in 1998, one of the largest management buyouts in UK history. IPC Magazines continues to evolve still further in 1999, with the formation of five limited companies based on the former publishing groups - IPC Connect, IPC SouthBank, IPC tx, IPC ignite! and IPC Country & Leisure Media.

The 2000s
New millennium, new name - IPC Magazines is renamed IPC Media in 2000, a new identity to go hand-in-hand with a strategy based on being a brand-centric business. Time Warner acquires IPC Media for a cool £1.15bn in October 2001 - the biggest magazine deal ever seen in the UK and the biggest transatlantic media deal of our time. ignite! launches Nuts, the world's first men's weekly magazine, in January 2004. Backed by an £8 million marketing investment, it's the biggest launch in IPC's history. After 30 years in King's Reach Tower, IPC announces in May 2004 that it is to move into brand new offices next to the Tate Modern in 2007. IPC Connect unveils the new generation Real Life weekly for women - Pick Me Up in January 2005. The launch is backed by a £6million marketing investment and with the largest sampling exercise in UK magazine history. IPC tx unveils TVeasy in April 2005 - the third major launch in 16 months from IPC Media's innovations programme, initiated by chief executive Sylvia Auton in 2003. The magazine is Britain's very first compact paid-for TV Listings weekly and is backed by a £10million marketing investment. In Feb 2007 IPC Connect launches Look - the UK's first glossy high street fashion and celebrity style weekly magazine. In a joint venture with Groupe Marie Claire, and backed by an £18m investment, LOOK is IPC's biggest ever launch. IPC Media develops great new digital media brands such as housetohome, goodtoknow and shootinguk. In November 2007, IPC Inspire acquires TrustedReviews.com - the website that delivers original, expert reviews about consumer electronics & IT equipment across 21 different product categories. IPC Ignite acquires Mousebreaker in June 2008 - the essential free-to-play gaming site. Featuring over 200 online flash-based games, Mousebreaker leads the free casual games sector in the UK.

The 2010s
In January 2010, IPC Media restructured around three key audience groups: men, mass-market women and up-market women. IPC launches two new monthly magazines - Style at Home and goodtoknow Recipes. In June 2011, IPC Connect launches a major new brand - Feelgood games - targeting mass market mums with the very best games and rewarding them with real gifts.

*No longer owned by IPC Media

Monday, 7 October 2013

Essay

To what extent should magazines be held responsible for the social ramifications of the representations they offer?

I think magazines are partly responsible for the social ramifications of the representatives they offer, as they can sometimes be misleading to teenage girls and sometimes even teenage boys. Even though many of the magazines target mainly teenage girls they do also attract a young male audience and teenage boys feel just as pressured as teenage girls to look a certain way and act in a specific manner in order to “fit in” with today’s culture. Many of the magazines offered articles that contained explicit and mature themes, such as “More” magazine which reads clearly on the front page ‘sex, fashion, celebs’. Although sex isn’t viewed as a taboo topic anymore, the magazine throws the word around and makes it seem as if it’s a regular occurrence. It also contains a naked picture of the celebrity Rhianna on the front, which is giving the impression that in order to be sexy and appealing you must be naked. Making teenage girls think that in order to gain attention this is what they should do, it also has a reverse effect and makes teenage boys think that girls have loose morals and low self-respect.

of the other magazines that gained my attention was “Bliss” with ‘Holiday Horrors’ written in bold underneath ‘Raped on the beach’, I think that teenage girls should be taught that the world we live in isn’t always a safe place and ways to prevent and deal with incidents like rape and sexual assault, but I think there should be a more subtle and delicate approach to the situation as it may confuse and frighten some teenagers. Some teenage girls may also find that they are not ready to hear about the details of the topic yet.

The Selena Gomez edition of “Shout” magazine also got me thinking, on the left third magazine it gives the introduction to the article ‘Make him fancy you’, in young teenagers magazines a majority of the magazinesassume that all teenage girls are heterosexual and include articles on boys. I would like to see more controversial topics included in young people’s magazines like being: gay, lesbian, bisexual, transsexual. Also to cover more race and religion related topics. If more of the listed subjects were covered and introduced to children from a young age there would most probably be a lot less discrimination, racism and homophobia etc. As children will be able to relate from a young age and learn that everyone is different and there is no right or wrong religion, race or ethnicity.

I also would like to see teenage magazines encourage that not everything is based on how you look and that show you feel is more important. Magazines pick specific celebrities for their covers, the image of the celebrity is usually reflecting the magazine or magazine articles, or just plainly an endorsement as we are more inclined to buy a magazine with our favourite celeb on the front cover. But the celebrities on the front are usually seen as having the ‘perfect body’ and there isn’t a lot of variation of body types. And teenagers may think that if their body type isn’t there that it isn’t right.

Overall, I think that magazines are partly to blame but there are also other contributing factors like Television the fashion industry, music and social networking sites.

Thursday, 3 October 2013

Teen Magazines are Sexualising Readers

A study by The Sunday Telegraph of several magazines aimed at teenage girls found that they contained sexually-explicit material which was potentially in breach of the industry's editorial code.
Campaigners have attacked the magazines' self-regulatory body as "toothless" and have called for an independent organisation to monitor the publications, which are read by children as young as 11.
The move comes after Jacqui Smith, the Home Secretary, ordered a review into whether young girls are being sexualised through fashion, music, computer games and other industries.
Bliss magazine, whose readers have an average age of 15, features on the front of this month's issue the cover lines "The Sex Factor, your questions answered on p46" and "Gang raped – for a mobile phone."
April's Sugar magazine, with readers aged 14 on average, features a spread entitled "Is it a crush or are you gay?". This month's Top of the Pops Magazine, with readers aged 11 to 15, is sold with a set of "Kiss Me!" stickers.
It features photos of shirtless male celebrities and a picture of Justin Gaston, an underwear model, who appears to be naked except for a panel covering his private parts.
Bliss's website has previously invited girls to send in photographs of themselves to be marked on "looks and pullability" in a contest called "How Sexy Am I?" while Sugar has an annual modelling competition for girls asking: "Want fame, freebies and fit lads?"
The Teenage Magazine Arbitration Panel (TMAP), the industry's self-regulatory body whose members include publishers and editors, is supposed to ensure that "the sexual content of teenage magazines is presented in a responsible and appropriate manner".
The very blatantly sexual ethos expressed in them is becoming normalised among young girls. Then we wonder why we have such high teenage pregnancy rates and a booming ladette culture.

Wednesday, 2 October 2013

5 Magazine Covers Aimed at Teenage Girls

The typical conventions of a teenage girls magazines consists of young celebrities as the main image, the celebrity shown is 99% of the time female, only with occasional exceptions. They are also very particular with the celebrities that are chosen to be on the cover, making sure they give off the right 'image' for their magazine. They are all very airbrushed making them appear to have spot and blemish free skin, and are slim or curvy. With no in-between. Which can make teenage girls feel under pressure, to look like the celebs on the front page of their favourite magazine.

Also, they all feature stereotypical topics that they think all teenage girls are interested in such as: Fashion, Make up, Beauty, Boys/Sex. Tagline's like: "Boys, Boys, Boys" or "Make him fancy you", "Boys mates and style sorted". Are frequently used on all of the magazines, which makes an assumption that all teenage girls are hetro-sexual. And that if they're not then theres something wrong with them, it also makes the assumption that by that age they're interested in boys and encourages them to seek relationships, when in fact it may not be the case.

Majority of them always include the colour pink on the cover to attract a young female audience, as pink is a connotation for girlie and being feminine.