2009 was such a horrendous year for print media, up against the wall because of the fall in advertising revenue and a decline in circulation, that I was surprised and cheered to stumble across a publication that actually succeeded in growing ad revenue.

Unless you’re a Business Day subscriber, you wouldn’t have come across Wanted, which was started five and a half years ago and is modelled on How to Spend It, the magazine put out by the Financial Times. Just like How to Spend It, it’s a glossy high-end monthly magazine and its advertisers are luxury brands such as Pernod Ricard, Vendome and Montblanc.

Advertising doesn’t come cheap in Wanted and even though the luxury-goods companies were hit by the recession last year, Wanted still exceeded its ad targets. In the 2008/09 financial year (till the end of March) the magazine exceeded its target by 140%, says Antoinette van Wyk, who oversees Wanted’s advertising. At the moment, with about two months to go before the end of the 2009/10 financial year, they’ve hit the 140% mark.

Wanted’s editor, Gary Cotterell, says he knew that luxury-goods companies would be affected by the recession last year and was pleasantly surprised that the magazine maintained its growth. Most months last year, the magazine was over 60 pages and even got up to 138 pages. (Advertising determines the amount of pages you print in newspapers and magazines.)

In a year when many magazines shut up shop in South Africa, this is really remarkable.

Part of Wanted’s success can be attributed to it being one of the very few South African magazines to play in the luxury space. There are a couple of others such as Prestige but, really, Wanted is in a class of its own as it’s packed with original content. Prestige always seems a tad press-release driven… TO READ THE REST OF THIS COLUMN ON MONEYWEB, CLICK HERE.

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