August 21, 2007

News Magazines rebrands biggest mag in UK

News Magazines has relaunched the Sky customer title, the biggest magazine in the UK by circulation, in a bid to appeal to ABC1 women.

Under new editor Lysanne Currie, the title has shorted its name from Sky: the magazine to Skymag and introduced a raft of TV personalities as columnists in a bid to up the glossy ante on the title. Regular columnists include Channel 4 stylist Gok Wan on style & beauty; BBC presenter Ben Fogle on eco-living and Observer agony aunt Mariella Frostrup on arts & culture.

News Magazines said that the revamped title would be more upmarket in its approach with a glossier look and feel, and is expected to appeal to ABC1 women.

The magazines division of News International, home to real life title Love it!, won the contract to publish the biggest magazine in the UK from John Brown last year.

Currie joined John Brown as editor of Sky, moving to News magazines when they won the contract to publish the title. She has previously worked as consultant editor on New Woman at Emap, on the launch of Psychologies at Hachette and has also worked as a showbiz writer on the Daily Mirror.

Sky: the magazine has an ABC OF 7,034,310, up 3.5 per cent year on year, making it the top title in the UK in terms of total average circulation. The sale of the main magazine is part of a portfolio of Sky titles run by various publishers. John Brown publishes its kids magazine, Future holds the contract for Sky Movies and Haymarket the contract for Sky Sports. Movies and sports make up the top three titles by circulation.

Seven of the top ten titles in the latest ABCs figures are customer magazines. These include the three Sky magazines and the contract titles of Tesco, Asda, Sainsbury’s and Somerfield. Three newsstand TV listings titles – Radio Times, What’s On TV and TV Choice – make up the rest of the field.