Some, however, saw promise and said that Time, with its strict church-state divide — editorial and ad sales — was hamstrung in the changing media world because rivals could do deals with advertisers and marketers that Time could not. “This is a critical move away from a 1980s-style management structure that was Time Inc.,” said Peter Kreisky, who, in 2011, was a consultant and former aide to the short-lived CEO Jack Griffin.
Thought leaders in the global magazine industry have learned quite a few essential lessons over the past five turbulent and transformative years, and Peter Kreisky of US-based Kreisky Media Consultancy, shared them with the audience of the 39th FIPP World Magazine Congress today in Rome. “Success is digital first: not digital only, not plus digital, but digital first,” was the mantra of his presentation.
Media consultant Peter Kreisky shares some pointers to take from 10 magazine publishers which were said to be taking the lead within the industry.
“Time Inc.’s source of strategic leverage has historically been scale,” Kreisky said. “That only applies when you put a ringed fence around the industry. But that ringed fence has been breached by the new digital competitors. Leadership by the old measures is increasingly irrelevant.”
THE GUARDIAN March 9, 2013. Time Inc has been without effective leadership for four years, said Peter Kreisky, a former senior advisor to Time Inc and chairman of Kreisky Media, a media strategy firm. This ship has been sailing rudderless through the most turbulent time the magazine industry has ever faced. Kreisky said editorial too should share blame for Time Inc.'s problems. The division is within the company, he said, and its great brands had not been allowed to flourish because of internal politics. Editorial has a huge fear of loss of control. The focus has been on content, editors control what happens to the brands. That is why you have never seen People TV, the editors would be too scared that Turner (Time Warners TV division) would claim it. Kreisky said Time Inc.'s historic brands could find a new lease on life under new ownership. New management will be able to leverage these brands in ways that they have not been able to do in the past, he said. I am optimistic, he said. Well, potentially optimistic.
A deal with Meredith would have been “an elegant solution”, says Peter Kreisky, a media consultant and former advisor to Time Inc. Meredith had synergies with many of Time Inc’s titles. The combined companies could have consolidated some of their magazines, editorial staffs and advertising sales teams.
NEW YORK TIMES. Feb 25, 2013. “If you take Time, Fortune and Sports Illustrated from the mix, you have much greater similarity to the titles that are left than differences,” said Peter Kreisky, who worked as a senior adviser to Mr. Griffin at Time Inc. and who also has advised Meredith in the past. Mr. Kreisky said that when he was hired by Meredith a decade ago to reinvent its corporate strategy, the magazine company was trying to expand beyond the category of shelter magazines. He pointed to its acquisitions of Gruner & Jahr’s magazines, like Family Circle, and to how its existing titles expanded their platforms, as Better Homes and Gardens did in its licensing deal with Wal-Mart Stores and its television specials. Mr. Kreisky noted that Time Inc. had not leveraged its highly regarded brands as profitably over the years, suggesting that they could have developed a television network affiliated with People. “Meredith is a very businesslike company,” Mr. Kreisky said. “They’re very practical, pragmatic. They don’t sacrifice editorial integrity. But they take a balanced approach to the development of their brands, whereas Time Inc. had an obsessive need for editorial control for everything around their brands. As a result, they’ve lost huge opportunities to develop their brands in other platforms.”
WERTHEIMER: What do you think the odds that in 10 years time we'll still find this fat little magazine sitting on the table in the doctor's office? KREISKY: It may still be in the doctor's office - oddly enough - but I'm not sure that it'll be the same mass circulation magazine that it has traditionally been. There's always a market for old media. I mean, if you think about it, even stone tablets still have a place in our society. They just happen to be in cemeteries. (LAUGHTER) WERTHEIMER: Peter Kreisky, of Kreisky Media, his company is focused on the media and entertainment industry, including publishing in all its forms - including tablets, stone tablets.