Arena closure-wrong sector or wrong market

Yesterday's news of the demise of Arena magazine has the commentators saying is this going to be the first of many.

The magazine industry in some ways thinks that it is partially immune to the media downturn.Think of a magazine as a sort of comfort food that will keep people's dreams alive and allow some escape in bad times.

However the sector despite keeping readers will lose that segment of revenue that is critical,advertising.

For Arena it will shut after 22 years after yesterday's announcement by the Bauer group

As Paid Content reports

Arena’s UK circulation for H208 actually increased 16.4 percent year on year to 29,374, according to ABC, but 11,800 of that was “controlled free distribution,” giving it a paid-for circ of just 17,071. And that really is meagre compared to its rivals and even Bauer’s other big men’s titles: FHM sold an average of 272,545 month, while Zoo sells 145,555 a week on average.

Now the bets are on for the next men's magazine to fall.The sector is seen as a declining one after the heyday of Zoo and FHM and is up against changing social perceptions as well as declining revenues.

For a good analysis of the problem at Arena it is worth reading Brian Schofield's piece on media Guardian.He is a contributing editor to Arena and

can easily pinpoint the decision that set in motion the unstoppable slide to doom: the first decision to run an exposed breast.

ie the decision to chase those titles mentioned above.