Faceoff: Gardening

Folio: The Magazine for Magazine Management, April 1, 2004

Gardening titles are blooming this spring: More than $100 billion will be spent at gardening centers this year, and gardeners consult more than one title for their trowel tips. All three of these magazines boast well-, if not muddy-, heeled readers with annual household incomes of more than $113,000. Not quite Fortune numbers ($165,200), but significantly more than Time's readers ($66,773). Here are some of the top players. - Mark J. Miller

Horticulture (F&W Publications)

Ad Pages: 147

Newsstand: 1,891,217

Subscribers: 8,594

Total Paid subs: 228,653

New Advertiser: Target, WD-40, Suburu

The great grandfather of gardening magazines, Horticulture is thriving in its 100th year. The March/April issue broke a record for the title with 60 percent more ad pages than last year. Ad pages are driving plans for regional supplements this year and next. Since 2002, when the magazine was purchased from Primedia by former Primedia founder Bill Reilly, Horticulture has been redesigned and the price increased $2, to $6.99. The mag sells in gardening centers and some floral shops.

"We've been in those centers for about seven years, and the single-copy buyers there convert to be some of our best subscribers," says publisher Joel Toner. Those subscribers have an average household income of $127,000. The bimonthly holds 12 symposiums a year and daylong garden seminars across the country.

The title is launching a book series and has two spin-offs: quarterly Garden Style and biannual Home Turf. "It's a single-copy product, and advertisers are loving it," says Toner. On the competition: "Horticulture is one of the more sophisticated titles targeted at home gardeners."

Fine Gardening (Taunton Press)

Ad Pages: 160

Newsstand: 65,629

Subscribers: 124,451

Total paid subs: 190,080

New Advertiser: Burpee Seeds

This 15-year-old bimonthly is the only one in the group to feature solely endemic advertising. "Both readers and advertisers see it as an essential complement to the editorial," says publisher Beth Conklin. Fine Gardening originally targeted professional horticulturists but has spread to more general readers, who have more than $128,000 in household income. About 96 percent are homeowners and 78 percent are female.

Those readers are part of a renewed effort to boost circ: Focus groups and reader surveys are underway, and the editors are out meeting subscribers for the first time. That initiative ia paying with a renewal rate of 60 percent and a 21 percent rise in newsstand sales in 2003, says Conklin.

The July/August issue set new newsstand records, selling over 90,000 issues. Home centers make up 10 percent of newsstand sales, but it's also sold in airports, supermarkets, and mega-stores. Annual subs cost $29.95. On the competition: "Gardeners tend to take numerous publications," says Conklin, "but more than 50 percent of our subscribers say they take Fine Gardening exclusively."

Garden Design (World Publications)

Ad Pages: 214

Newsstands: 37,134

Subscribers: 268,021

Total paid subs: 305,155

New Advertiser: Neutrogena, Home Depot

These days consumers can spend thousands on garden furniture, says Garden Design and Saveur (a gourmet-food-and-wine title) group publisher Ted Gramkow. It's those dollars that Garden Design is building its brand on.

The 10-year-old bimonthly moved its rate base down from 300,000 to 250,000 and used the savings to invest in a partial redesign and put more money into events, such as GD's Golden Trowel awards and flower shows in major cities, where GD brings in the "rock stars of gardening" (Britain's John Brooks, "the father of modern garden design," and California's Jack Chandler). The magazine won 2003's Garden Globe Award, conferred by garden writers.

The average reader is a 49-year-old woman with a household income of over $113,000. Most ads are endemic, but "readers can afford flat-panel televisions and Sub-Zero fridges," says Gramkow. "There's no reason not to let them know about those products."

On the competition: "None of the others can claim having the rock stars of garden design involved with their events," says Gramkow.