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Question 3 - What Kind of media
institution might distribute your media
product and why?
Ashley Tonks

2. A distributer is a company who supplies media products to the stores that sell them to
consumers. So in my case the producer of the magazine would go to a distributer to
get the magazine published and into the retailers.
There are many different distribution companies around the world and they all focus on
different magazines and genres. When investigating what type of distribution company
I would like to use to launch my magazine, I have looked into what type of companies
are distributing magazines currently. I have looked into a few magazines which focus
on urban music and have also researched the companies which distribute the
magazines I looked at in research and planning.
I started off looking at Bauer Media who distribute Q Magazine. Bauer Media have an
audience of 19 million people in the UK alone and distribute magazines like Q, Grazia,
Empire, Take a Break as well as 282 other magazines worldwide in
more than 10 countries. However, I have used Q magazine for
inspiration and some elements of its content will be similar to my own
music magazine ‘Beat’. It would be very difficult to expect Bauer
Media to take on my magazine as they already distribute a
magazine which has some similar features. So if they did take me on I
think it would be extremely hard to gain readers from Q as this is such a well respected
magazine and already has a massive fan base. Therefore, I would have to either
include something unique about my magazine or have a look at other companies.
The next distribution company I looked at was IPC Media. These are the distributors of
NME as well as many other mainstream magazines. They seem to focus more on
indieand rock music so I don’t think that IPC Media would be interested in taking on an
urban style magazine. As NME is already a popular selling
magazine and is one of their more successful magazines I
don’t think they would be ready to branch off into a new
style of music. However, they are looking on their websites
for new R’n’BMagazines as this is an area they wish to go
into next. But other than the mainstream magazines they distribute smaller magazines
which come from independent companies and have a program for up and coming
media packages.

3. I have looked into independent distribution companies like the7star
and to distribute my magazine. But this is very uncommon with urban
music magazines as they normally focus on hip-hop magazines like
VIBE as these are more popular magazines as they feature chart
music ect. I doubt that I would be
able to find an independent
distribution company which specialised in urban music
and probably isn’t the best type of distribution company to go for.
So I looked at Conde Nastdigital to distribute my magazine. They are different from IPC
Media and Bauer Media because they don’t already distribute urban music magazines.
However, they do distribute other successful
magazines such as Vogue, GQ, Easy Living
and wired which is a major pop music
magazine in the UK. Therefore, I know that
they’re reliable and will be able to get as
much public awareness towards my magazine as possible. They have a large amount
of shops in different countries, which are already buying magazines off them but always
expanding their business. So I think that they would be the most suitable to company to
distribute my music magazine.
On the other hand, I would also want my magazine to be distributed to Apple, as over
15 billion apps are downloaded each month and around
20 million of these are subscriptions to magazines. As a
result, this will make the magazine more accessible to
people reading the magazine and also own apple
products. This is such a good opportunity, which I think any
media company would be stupid not to use as so many
more people are using digital copies of magazines rather than hard copies. The print
industry is drying up and I think that in 10 years maybe 20 years everything will be digital.
However, not everyone has access to apple products. 650,000 people have accounts
on the Android app store and this number increases every day. They sell books and
magazines in a digital format, which is becoming more and more popular as many
people see it as a way of getting more affordable than buying the physical copy.
Android books/magazines they have to compete with the likes of Apple.

4. This makes me think that Conde Nast Digital would be the best media company to
distribute my magazine. This is because they offer not only hard copies of all their
magazines but also a digital version which can be brought through ITunes or the
android app store.
In conclusion, I think that Conde Nast Digital would be the most appropriate company
to distribute my magazine as they provide a more modern process to how magazines
are distributed to the public. I could also branch out if successful to reach more readers
through the use of Apple IOS and Android app store.