Question 3: What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?

I chose not to go with the publishing company Dennis as their magazine’s they publish include ‘Viz’ and ‘evo’ which are both targeted at a middle aged/older male audience which is the complete opposite to my target audience. However, going with a smaller but fairly well-known publisher may be an advantage as they do not publish any magazines that would be competition to mine. Also, they publish ‘Health and Fitness’ which is a women’s magazine but the average age of their target audience is not the same as mine. This is also the only female targeted magazine they publish where the majority of their other magazines are targeted at a middle age male market, therefore I don’t think it would be very promising if I chose to publish a magazine with a company like them.

Another option is to self-publish my magazine like ‘Clash’ but that would involve a lot of money from printing and distributing and if my magazine wasn’t successful a lot of money could be lost. It is likely that I would need a website to sell my magazine from but also to help me distribute the magazine across the country. This would also increase the cost as I would have to pay postal charges. However, it could be at an advantage as I wouldn’t have any competition within the company. But, it could make it harder for me to compete with similar mainstream magazine’s like ‘Q magazine’ and ‘NME’ because they are owned by large publishers who can afford to advertise where I couldn’t making it a disadvantage. Also I would struggle to get my magazine into large retailers and supermarkets because of the cost. Instead I would only be able to put it in small retailers like local newsagents resulting in a lower publicity and a limited number of areas it is available.

                Bauer could be a potential publisher as they are a massive company and are the biggest privately owned publisher in Europe. They would be good to publish my magazine as they are a well-known company and also publish magazines with a similar target audience to mine. They would also be able to put it into major retail stores like ‘WHSmith’ meaning I would have a large publicity of my magazine and it would be available nationwide. Although, it would mean I would make less money from the magazine as they are likely to take a large share of the profit. But, if my magazine didn’t make as much profit as I’d hoped I would be losing very little and the large successful company would be able to recover from their loss from profits from other magazines.  However, they already publish ‘Q magazine’ which is a very similar genre to my magazine which would create a lot of competition. IPC media would also be a good publisher for me to use as again it already publishers many magazines that have a similar target audience to mine. However, they publish ‘NME’ which is again a magazine with a similar genre. 

                I came to the conclusion that Conde Nast publications would be the best publisher to publish my magazine. This is because they don’t produce a magazine that would be competition to mine. Also, they have magazines that have a similar target audience so my magazine might appeal to them. Their magazines include ‘Glamour’ and ‘Vogue’ which are heavily fashion related and are aimed at women. I expect my target audience to appreciate fashion and art so I believe this publisher would be ideal for my magazine. It also publishes very popular and well-known women’s magazines such as ‘vogue’ which may help the sales of my magazine. Also, as the audience is similar they could advertise my magazine in their existing magazines.