poptimists | End of an era. For reals.

Emap to close Smash Hits magazine after 28 years
by Jennifer Whitehead Brand Republic 2 Feb 2006

Smash Hits: brand will live on

LONDON - Emap is to close Smash Hits magazine after 28 years, succumbing to the trend of young readers deserting magazines to spend time online and their money on mobile phone content.

In the last set of circulation figures, published by the ABC in August 2005, Smash Hits reported a drop of 4.4% to report sales of just over 120,000 copies an issue -- hundreds of thousands of copies fewer than it sold in its heyday in the late 1980s.

Smash Hits will live on as a brand in the form of a music television channel, which is available on cable and satellite, and a digital radio station, which launched on Freeview in 2002. The last issue of the magazine will appear on February 13.

As well as being the music and entertainment bible for a generation of teenagers, the magazine famously counts a number of celebrities among its former staff. These include Pet Shop Boys frontman Neil Tennant, who once boasted of having introduced the phrase "pur-lease" to the magazine, and the 'X Factor' host Kate Thornton.

The magazine was founded in 1978 by Nick Logan, who had previously edited the NME. Logan went on to create 80s fashion bible The Face.

Things are tough in the market for teenage publications. The Sunday Times is considering closing its children's supplement The Funday Times, while Hachette Filipacchi abandoned ElleGirl magazine after four years because of its dwindling circulation.

In the August 2005 ABCs, not one of the teenage-targeted magazines recorded a rise in circulation.

Publishers blame a variety of factors for the desertion of readers, including more diverse tastes in music and fewer exciting stars, and more competition for pocket money as teens turn their mobile phones for entertainment.