Lang: rate negotiation worked

Folio: The Magazine for Magazine Management, May, 1990 by Lisa I. Fried

BOSTON-Rate negotiation actually improved the fortunes of McCall's, said Dale Lang, who, having sold the title almost one year ago, has had time to reflect on the furor he started with the magazine's open rate card.

Lang said he was surprised at the industry reaction because the magazine reaped its biggest profit when it was sold with an open rate card. "Negotiating doesn't have to mean discounts," he added, speaking at a recent meeting co-sponsored by Magazine Publishers of America and the Boston Ad Club.

"When we went to an open rate card, we made more profit than we were making before," he said. "We told advertisers, You pay more for some things [like positioning] and less for others.

in fact, one ad agency executive who did business with McCall's at that time says, "Their deals were no big deal."

Last year, McCall's reached 74.8 million in ad revenue, a 9 percent increase from 1986, the year Lang became a part owner in the magazine and bought Working Mother. The sales staff for McCall's began selling with an open rate card for the September 1987 issue; The New York Times Company, which bought the magazine last summer, returned to a specified rate card in February 1990.

Despite his success with the open card, Lang said he is now more concerned than ever about rate cutting and advertisers' obsession with circulation numbers.

"Magazines are really about the relationship between the editorial and the reader," he said. "Sassy [owned by Lang] gets more letters from its readers in a month than McCall's ever got in a year. Yet I've never had an advertiser ask me about the kind of response I get from readers. "

Lang also said that a drop in overall magazine ad spending this year will prompt large, multi-title publishers to seek out more packaged ad buys. "We naively thought McCall's and Working Mother would be a good buy to reach all women, but I found that I couldn't package McCall's with anything other than another even Sister."

Lang also said the industry might see "the demise of independent publishers," citing Owen Lipstein's sale of American Health as an example. Roberta Garfinkle, vice president and director of print media for McCann-Erikson, echoed Lang's sentiments at the meeting. "Look what happened with Family Media's Taxi and Model. [President Bob Riordan] couldn't give those books away.

"It would appear that independent publishers can't get or find financing to keep magazines going," she said. "Bob Riordan and Owen Lipstein are evidence of that. "