Periodical publishing

Canadian publishers are pumping out more periodicals than ever before and pulling in far greater revenues, according to new data from the Periodical Publishing Survey, which paints a positive portrait of the industry.

Between 1993 and 2003, the periodical publishing industry showed steady gains in the number of magazines, total revenue and circulation.

Industry revenues hit nearly $1.6 billion in 2003, up 22.5% from 1998 and a 56.5% increase from 1993. During the 10-year period, the industry's profit margin rose from 5.0% of revenues to 9.7%.

Magazine publishing activity has increased steadily since 1993 when 1,256 publishers produced 1,678 titles with a total annual circulation of 575 million copies.

Ten years later, 1,633 publishers produced 2,383 periodicals and sold nearly 778 million copies. This 42% increase in the numbers of titles had a positive impact on total revenues.

In 2003, French periodicals accounted for about one-fifth of total revenues, periodicals and circulation.

The survey covers consumer magazines including general consumer periodicals, as well as special interest consumer magazines such as those on cooking or science; business and trade magazines; farm periodicals; and religious and scholarly magazines.

Advertising revenues improve, while subscription sales drop

During the 10-year period, advertising revenues accounted for a growing proportion of total revenue, while the share from subscription sales declined.

In 2003, sales of advertising space represented 64% of total revenue, up from about 61% a decade earlier. On the other hand, subscription sales accounted for about 19% of revenues in 2003, down from about 25%. The sale of single copies remained constant at about 7.5% of revenue over the entire period.

Advertising revenues hit $993.5 million in 2003. Advertising has always been the primary source of revenue for most Canadian magazines, but the fight over that advertising dollar is fierce.

Media such as television and newspapers, and now the Internet, have forced Canadian periodicals to become more competitive in their search for advertising dollars. Canadian magazines also face competition from the foreign split-run magazines, which are published outside Canada, but include Canadian advertising in their Canadian regional editions.

From 1993 to 2003, mailing costs have risen and have contributed to higher subscription prices. To help offset these costs, the federal Publication Assistance Program has increased its funding to help defray the cost of distributing subscriber-paid copies of publications.

Business and trade magazines have relied most heavily on advertising sales, which accounted for 84% of their revenues in 2003. As most of these periodicals are free, their costs are covered primarily by advertising.

In contrast, about 56% of general consumer magazine revenues came from advertising, but the average advertising revenue amounted to more than $1 million per title.

Farm periodicals, which meet the needs of a specialized rural market, followed a different pattern. Just over three-quarters of their revenues came from advertising, although most of them required paid subscriptions as well.

At the other end of the scale, religious magazines and scholarly periodicals relied far less on advertising and more on subscriptions and other revenues such as grants, memberships and donations.

Average revenues, profit reached a plateau between 1998 and 2003

Average revenues per magazine, as well as average profit levels, reached a plateau between 1998 and 2003 because of the much greater number of titles on newsstands, in particular specialized niche magazines.

Revenues per magazine rose from $591,500 in 1993 to $625,800 in 1998 and reached $651,800 in 2003.

At the same time, the profit per magazine rose from about $29,600 in 1993 to $64,000 in 1998. It remained virtually steady at this level in 2003. Technological advancements in printing processes have resulted in lower production costs per copy and have also contributed to the influx of new titles.

During the 10-year period, the number of titles of consumer magazines in particular, both general and special interest, increased 62%. This growth has resulted in a dispersal of audience and lower revenue per title.

A number of magazines that survived the early 1990s have since experienced an improvement in revenues and profit margin. The disappearance of unprofitable magazines also accounted for some of the increase in overall profitability.

Big industry for volunteers

The periodical publishing industry relies to a large extent on volunteers and unpaid staff, although their numbers remained relatively constant between 1998 and 2003 after rising during the previous five-year period.

Just over 5,200 volunteers helped to produce magazines in 2003. Magazines had nearly 6,500 full-time employees and just over 3,000 part-time employees.

The number of people required to produce a magazine dropped considerably during the 10-year period. In 1993, an average of 7.2 full-time, part-time and volunteer workers put out each title. By 2003, this had declined to 6.2. The number of full-time employees per title fell from 3.1 to 2.7.

At the same time, taking into account salary increases over the decade, average wages and salaries per title remained much the same.

French-language magazines less dependent on advertising

There is a noticeable difference between English-language and French-language magazine publishing in Canada. French-language magazines are less dependent on advertising than their English counterparts, while they earn more from individual sales.

As a group, French language magazines were more profitable. In 2003, their profit margin was 15.4% of total revenues, compared with 8.6% for English magazines.

Sales of advertising space represented two-thirds of revenues in 2003 for English-language magazines. However, ads averaged only slightly more than half of revenues for French titles.

English-language titles face greater competition at the newsstand from imported magazines. They reported only 5% of revenues from single copy sales, while such sales accounted for nearly 18% of revenues for French-language titles.

For both types of magazines, subscriptions accounted for less than one-fifth of revenues.

Definitions, data sources and methods: survey number 3139.

Selected data from the Periodical Publishing Survey are now available online in table format in the publication Periodical Publishing: Data Tables (87F0005XIE, free). From the Our products and services page under Browse our Internet products, choose Free then Communications. Special tabulations are available on a cost-recovery basis.

For more information, or for enquiries on the concepts, methods and data quality of this release, contact Client Services, Culture Statistics Program (1-800-307-3382 or 613-951-7608; fax: 613-951-9040; cult.tourstats@statcan.gc.ca), Culture, Tourism and the Centre for Education Statistics.