Stop press? Print magazines are having a moment
For years, we’ve been told print is over and social media is king, but could it be that print magazines are coming back?
Seven years after calling time on its magazine as part of a move towards a social-first strategy, online fashion giant ASOS has brought its magazine back… and it’s not the only one.
Microsoft launched its first-ever print magazine, Signal, just last year in a bid to 'cut through the noise' of digital. While former British Vogue editor Edward Enninful launched quarterly title 72, describing his ambition to create something tactile and collectible. Elsewhere, brands from IKEA to dating apps have been experimenting with print as a way to tell richer stories away from increasingly crowded feeds.
Plus, audiences haven't abandoned magazines either. According to the Advertising Association, 72% of UK adults consume print or online magazine content every month, with one in three still picking up printed magazines.
When we're surrounded by an endless stream of content designed to be consumed, swiped and forgotten in seconds, a beautifully made magazine asks us to do something increasingly unusual: stop for a minute and spend some time with it.
From scrollable to collectible
But in a world where content is quite literally everywhere, what’s the draw of a printed magazine? ASOS Brand Director, Steven Amir, says their print edition offers customers something “physical, considered and collectible.”
Unlike online media, a print magazine is tactile and invites its audience to really get to know the brand. There are no notifications popping up halfway through an article, no algorithm deciding whether they get to see more, and there’s also no competing content trying to muscle its way in.
Instead, you have space to tell bigger stories, showcase beautiful photography and design, bring together different voices and ideas and curate something people might actually want to keep.
For brands, a magazine can be so much more than another marketing channel. When it’s done really well, it becomes a physical expression of who you are.
Print media vs online media
There are things digital content does brilliantly. It can be reactive, interactive, measurable and it is often delivered to the right audience at exactly the right moment. Good social content builds communities and shares stories too (albeit in a different way).
Crucially, this new wave of magazines isn’t competing against online media, it's working to support it and show a different side of the brand. With ASOS, for example the new magazine will have a limited print-run (which arguably makes it eve more covetable), with a digital release on Substack and this sits within a much bigger campaign spanning social and CRM too.
We heart magazines
Perhaps we’re biased. We do, after all, make one ourselves.
We work with Caterfood Buying Group to create Infuse, its quarterly magazine for the foodservice industry.
Editorial, flatplanning, photography, design, styling and commissioning. The whole shebang.
The result is a piece of print content that the Caterfood Buying Group can physically put into the hands of its customers, filled not simply with products, but with trends, recipes, expert advice, support, inspiration, interviews and genuinely useful ideas for people working across hospitality, education and care. Take a look inside the autumn issue of Infuse.
Plus, the stories don't stop when the magazine lands. Content from each issue can live online, on social, in email and across other channels too, making the original investment work much harder.
So, is print media back?
Maybe the better question is whether it ever really left.
Print isn't going to replace TikTok, email or your website and nor should it. But brands like ASOS are recognising that the strongest content strategies don't necessarily choose between physical and digital. They give each channel a job to do and they ensure they do it well.
In a world of infinite scrolling, there’s something powerful about creating content with a front cover and a final page.
Long live print (there, we said it)
