Magazine & eMedia Publishing Professional & Social Network
Magazine start-up costs
I know this will probably return more questions than answers, but what does it cost to start a magazine these days? I'm talking about a national consumer publication, gloss cover and coated paper, maybe 75 pages of editorial, most art and photos supplied with a circ. of about 300,000? I don't have answers to distribution, sales, marketing, etc. I'm looking for a very ballpark figure on the hard costs to create a design template, editorial calendar, etc. for issue No. 1.
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Kevin Convertito on -
speaking strictly about just creating page templates for all features + departments, bare minimum $3-8k depending on the complexity of the project and number of revisions...costs could EASILY go way higher, not going to be less....you're not asking about printing + production costs are you?
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Permalink Reply by Kimberly Porrazzo on
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Thanks for the input. No, right now just the actual creation of the design and editorial wells. Have you done this from scratch before?
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Permalink Reply by Kevin Convertito on
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I've designed + built about a dozen mags from scratch, mostly new launches, but a few relaunches too...mostly videogame, skateboarding, and automotive tiles tho...and all consumer newsstand titles. here's a link to the publisher's note relating to an emergency 3-day rebuild + redesign I did for a car mag DSPORT earlier this year:
If I can't help out personally, I'm sure I can help recommend a talented magazine designer—my wife and I manage a loose network of professional freelancers in between the deadlines of our full time jobs ;)
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Permalink Reply by Kevin Convertito on
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Permalink Reply by Joshua Thomas on -
A lot depends on publication content, genre and design complexity. Depending on the complexity of creative needs, certain portions might be offshore-able reducing overall cost. I tend to lean towards in-house or domestic creative and rely on offshore for more production-oriented pages and labor, i.e. template pages like certain departments, TOC, etc. Even if there isn't much being done offshore, every little bit helps when working within tight startup budgets. Naturally, production and creative costs change drastically from one publication to the next. Kevin's prices are about on par with my experiences. Anywhere from $5-$10k as a starting point.
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