10/10/16 - Publishers become retailers in the market for survival (9)

10/10/16 - Publishers become retailers in the market for survival (9)

The struggle for the newspaper industry only appears to be getting worse with publishers even turning to retailing alongside their publication efforts. The institution involved in this case is Condé Nast, owner of GQ, Vogue and Vanity Fair among others. Their launch of Style.com, a luxury shopping site (e-commerce/e-tail), has seen them make an investment of £75m into it alone. A sense of synergy is also to be established with the other properties Condé Nast own, so that for example when readers see a product offer on GQ or Vogue, they are then linked to where they can actually purchase that same item on Style.com. One of the more questionable aspects of this decision to launch the website though, is whether it'll actually turn out to be a success for Condé Nast and the reaction that their already established audience may have to it. So for example as said in the article, if a product that's been 'raved about' in a magazine owned by Condé Nast turns out to also be promoted on the Style.com website, then people are going to become sceptical as to the practices of the company.

• Condé Nast has reportedly pumped £75m into the e-tail business 
• 'The audience of our magazines and websites around the globe comes to more than 300 million, a huge base of support with whom we already have an active relationship' - Jonathan Newhouse, chairman and chief executive of Condé Nast International
• Online shopping in the UK rose 11 per cent last year, according to IMRG and Capgemini, accounting for £114bn of sales

In my opinion, this article is representative of the measures that publishers are now willing to take in order to maintain survival within the industry. Not only is Condé Nast taking an e-media approach, but it's also selling products through it - retail. While they're doing this they're still keeping their print platform intact, but for how long this will be the case for is questionable. Regardless though, I think this article shows how not only the transition from print to e-media is continuing, but also how publishers may begin to take a lot more drastic measures to assure their survival as time goes on. Although it has been done by a publisher before, the fact that more notable ones are following suit is definitely something that should be noted.