How come magazines have so many ads? What if they didn't have any?

Question

My Marie Claire (full size) has 210 pages of ad's out of 410 pages of magazine and my Glamour (handbag size) has175 pages of ads out of 380 pages of magazine. Well annoying when practicaly every other page is an ad. Shouldn't have wasted my money on them.
Do magazines get pais to have ads? Marie Clair costs?? £2.80 a month and Glamour £2.00 a month I think. I get Marie Claire delivered and don't know the price but it is something like that.
If they didn't advertise they would have to charge more for the mag but it would cost less to print cause it would have less pages. It would look smaller and put people off buying it.
They need the money from ad's to pay for all the things they put into the mag and the wages trips and visits and fashion shoots and tall that stuff don't they.
WHY are there so many ad's? WHAT if there wern't any. I think my details kind of explain that point but if anyone has any info then thanks! I have never bought something from a magazine ad- no point!

Answer 1

If you had your own magazine and had to pay for your office space, your writers, layout people, editors, printers, photographers, distributors, the paper they're printed on and every other expense that goes into a magazine, you'd be shocked at how much it costs. Now divide that by how many people buy the magazine. If there weren't ads (no matter how pointless they seem to you) then there wouldn't be the extra revenue on top of the 2P you pay to publish the mag. The money they make from the ad outweighs the cost of the extra paper. Sorry, but it's simple economics.

Answer 2

Magazines have lots of ads so that they have bragging rights. If you check out the cover of fashion magazines, you will see that they says something like "738 pages of Fall Fashion". This "translates" in the publisher of the magazine being able to go to other advertisers and get them to purchase ads in the magazine. Readers than go to the newsstand and see said magazine with "738 pages of Fall Fashion" and buy it. The more people who buy that magazine, the higher the circulation figures are and the magazine can charge advertisers more money for ads. This also helps to off set the money that they lose on magazine subscriptions. If a person buys GQ for an entire year at the newsstand, it will cost they $4 an issue or about $50. But if they buy a subscription for a year, they only pay $18.

Answer 3

Hello Holly (Catherine?):

I think most people are right about this question - it's a matter of economics since the revenues generated by the sale of ads form a substantial part of a magazine's profits.

There is another side to this question however - magazines publish so many ads because there are so many companies demanding ad space. In marketing terms, it's far easier and financially prudent for a company with a specific target market to place their ads in media that are viewed by that target market than to randomly paste ads all over the internet and television. By strategically placing ads in a magazine that is popular with a specific group of people, a company can attract customers easily and cheaply.

Now think about all the fashion, design and make-up companies that might want to make customers out of Glamour readers. There's hundreds if not thousands of them and all of them will pay big bucks to get a spot in that magazine because it's STILL cheaper than a random ad campaign. Obviously, Glamour won't turn down an opportunity to make more money and so the demand is met, albeit at the cost of a magazine with half the pages devoted to ads.

So while one motivation for high advertising in magazines such as Marie Claire and Glamour is the desire to generate additional revenue, the reverse side is that there is also a huge demand for advertising space. Advertising works for the reader too - it keeps your costs down and, for all the "annoying ads", it hasn't stopped you from purchasing the magazine has it?

Answer 4

Your subscription or newstand price pays for the printing only. The advertisers pay for the writers, photographers, editors, etc. Most of the "things" in the magazine are free, provided by whoever makes it.

There are magazines without advertisements (like Cook's Illustrated) but they usually have plain paper and no or few color photographs. But if you want a nice glossy fashion mag, it's gonna have ads.

Also, maybe you don't buy anything directly because you saw it in an ad, but ads are also "brand recognition" which is a less tangible way of trying to sell you stuff. So that when you are shopping, you see something and recognize the brand, and hopefully have a good opinion of it.

Answer 5

Just to give you an idea of how much of your magazine is paid for by advertising, at 2006 rates, a full-page colour advertisement in "Glamour" magazine will cost the advertiser £142,310 - plus VAT!
On average circulation that is 6p per copy that does not have to go on the cover price.
If people like you were not influenced enough by seeing ads in magazines to go and buy the product, no one would advertise.

Answer 6

All them ad's help keep the price you pay on the magazine down but the price on the magazine should be a lot cheaper with all them DAM ad's..

The reason they have some many DAM ad's is B/C so they can make a lot of $$$$.. All they need it about 1/2 the ad's they have now & you would still be paying about the same price as you do now!!!

Answer 7

Like the others have answered, most magazines and mass media [I am making a generalisation] get their main income from advertising. This might sound overly cynical but in the case of television networks, their job is to 'sell audiences to the advertisers'. In newspapers, ads are put in first then the news to fill up space. Your subscription/retail price barely pays for anything, like someone else said as well. Yes of course magazines get paid to have ads in them, thousands for just one ad. If there weren't any then there'd be no affordable magazines. I think advertisers will be very interested in you since you aren't interested in magazine ads hehe

Answer 8

Agree with most answers. Ads help pay for the magazine. Without them the mags would probably cost $30-$40 and no-one could afford them.

Answer 9

Magazine companies rely on advertising and people buying the magazine to keep in business. If there were no advertisements, they would loose a lot of income, and the price of the magazine would go up.

Answer 10

I am with you all the way on this one. My friend bought me a years subscription to glamour for my birthday and i have been thinking the same thing. This mag is just full of ads!!!!!!!!! It is soooooooo annoying!!!! I feel bad about thinking this as it was a present and i don't want to appear ungrateful......but it is pants. More stories i say!