Wednesday, September 7, 2011

Thinner Magazines, Fewer Paper Mills

Another sign of the decline of magazines, perhaps: a company that makes paper for magazines, NewPage Corp, filed for bankruptcy. It is the largest Chapter 11 filing so far this year.

The pace of magazine closings and mergers may have slowed since last winter, but both magazines and catalogs have been getting thinner as publishers try to make their products less of an intrusion in readers’ lives, while also cutting back on mailing costs. The reduced page count, of course, also means a smaller demand for paper. NewPage had already announced plans to idle its one paper mill in Canada, which made newsprint mostly for U.S. newspapers, and its eight remaining U.S. mills are operating at less than full capacity.