August 12, 2015updated 14 Aug 2015 1:18pm

OMG! Owners of new women’s weekly take on Love It and merge magazines

The owners of OMG magazine have taken over Love It and merged the women's weeklies.

OMG magazine was founded this year by ACH Publishing. Love It has been running since 2006 when it recorded an average weekly circulation of more than 400,000.

According to ABC, this figure has been in steady decline since and Love It recorded an average circulation of just over 100,000 in the second half of 2014.

Love It's 13 August edition, published last week, listed 12 editorial staff. The title was published by Pep Publishing and based in Colchester, Essex.

The new magazine is edited by Paul Carter, of ACH Publishing, which is based in Manchester and Liverpool. No staff from the exisitng Love It title are working on the new magazine.

The new title, "Loveit! (incorporating OMG!)", will cost 65p – the same price as Love It and 5p cheaper than OMG.

Love It magazine was bought by Hubert Burda Media in 2008 from News International. In 2012, Hubert Burda chief executive Luke Patten bought the title, along with Full House – which closed in 2013 – under his new company, Pep Publishing.

Patten said: "We had three-and-a-half profitable and enjoyable years publishing the magazine but following the approach from ACH, we decided to accept their offer for the title. We wish them every success for the future."

The new magazine's editor, Carter, told Press Gazette: "Love It's an established brand, it sells more than OMG, and by taking it on we've invested a fair amount of money into it. We're going to up the competitions, up the quizzes, there's going to be more features in it – we just feel that we can put on readers, we can increase circulation."

He said the target was to take the new magazine's circulation to 100,000 "and build on that".

"It's not been over 100,000, I think, for about a year now, but there's no reason why it can't be. There's still 1.4m women's magazine buyers out there, so there is a market to grab.

"I know everyone says its a declining market, but there is potential to buck the trend.

"There's not been much investment in Love It over the past few years, so we're going to reinvest and see where we can take it."

Carter confirmed that no existing staff from Love It have moved with the magazine. He said the title currently employs ten full-time staff and two part-time. He said another two full-time staff are starting in September.

Topics in this article : Love It!