Times Inc (formerly IPC) has published magazines targeting various audiences over the years, expanding from upper class men in the 1800s to include women and a wider range of interests. IPC launched some of its longest running magazines in the late 1800s in genres like gardening, shooting, and cycling. In the 1920s-1940s, IPC expanded into magazines for women about home interests. IPC also published one of its most popular magazines, New Musical Express, in 1952 to capitalize on the music scene, showing its ability and willingness to publish new genres. IPC has adapted to changes over time, renaming to IPC Media in 2000 and focusing on key audiences like men and women in 2010, demonstrating its success

1. 1. What types of magazine and target audiences has Times Inc
(formally IPC) been associated with over the years?
A publishing company can be a standalone organisation eho only focuses on printing and
distributing printed products. Magazine producers used to create, produce and print the
magazines but this was very costly so they then decided to separate to stand alone as
companies. Companies either have national or international audience access and also
depending on what they are printing and distributing. IPC is an example of a large publishing
company that has international audience access.
1. What types of magazine and target audiences has Times Inc (formely IPC) been
associated with over the years?
1800-1900’s-
The Field launches in 1853 and within a year became the largest newspaper
in Europe, - This tells us that when IPC first started out as a company that because of
the time era these newspaper’s target audiences were going to be men. This is because
in the 1800-1900’s women were seen as subordinate and not supposed/allowed to be
interested in reading facts about the world. Newspapers are a product that is purely
based on facts and figures on what was going on in the world at that point. Also during
this time men were the only gender that had something to do with the war so this tells
me that this magazine was written for men to read, due to the fact that women were
supposed to just be housewives. Also we could argue the fact that this newspaper was
mainly targeted to upper class men as they understood what they were reading and
were a lot more logical in that day and age.
Eight further IPC titles that arethriving today were launched in the late
1800’s: Country life, Horse& Hound, Shooting Times, Yachting World,
Amateur Gardening, Cycling Weekly, Amateur Photography and The
Railway Magazine*.- This is telling us that IPC’s newspapers may have been quite
popular so now they want to branch out further in their business. As time goes on they
are able to move with them and keep up to date with new and interesting products for
their public. They have been logical and started to realise that their audience won’t just
want to read facts and figures about what was currently going on in the world but they
wanted something more specific, more different, more exciting… IPC produced specialist
magazines that fit into different genres and life categories keeping their audience locked
in and interested. For example, ‘Horse&Hound’ or ‘Yachting World’ tells us that these
magazines are target more to upper class men who have an interest in these hobbies so
that they want to read more into the hobby and subject because they have the money
to be involved in them. Whereas ‘amateur Gardening’ tells us that this magazine is

2. targeting more towards middle class men, hence the word ‘amateur’ shows us that this
is a magazine that the middle class people are also able to read, as it is within their
reach. This tells us that IPC are widening their target audiences to lots of different types
of people and subjects across the variety of products that they have been produced. This
also tells us that because they are targeting more or a wider reach rather than a niche
market; this will produce more income for the company as men now have a disposable
income to enable themselves to buy these magazines.
In 1889 - the then unheard of fortune of £1 a week for life to any reader who
could guess the amount of gold and silver in the Bank of England on a given
date.
This is a specific feature to IPC’s magazines which makes the magazine more
appealing and interesting to their target audiences. This tells us that the company
is now wealthy and has the finances to give away the competition prize of £1. In
my opinion the magazine is again targeted to upper or middle class men with a
disposable income, they can afford to buy these magazines. Also this shows us
that people may or may not be interested in the actual magazine that they’re
buying but just for the competition that the magazine includes, like gambling their
money on the magazine and hoping to win the prize. Personally I think that this is
more targeted towards middle class people as they’re more likely to need the
cash prize rather than upper class people because they already have the money.
• 1920s – 1940s
Launches in the home interest and women's weekly markets, launched the
new monthly Ideal Home in opposition to Newnes' Homes & Gardens.
During the 1920’s IPC began to increase their reach and focus on women, this
was a big step for the business which resulted in expanding their target market to
a whole new range. Although these new magazines are targeted towards women
and not men, overall IPC’s audience will now be unisex. The title of one of the
new monthly magazines was, ‘Ideal Home’. The target market for these
magazines in my opinion were middle class women, the genres of these
magazines were stereotypically the kind of hobbies and interests that these
women carried. They will learn new tips and facts for their homes and gardens
which they will put to use and find helpful. Whereas upper class women may not
read these magazines as much because they already have people who work on
their homes and gardens for them.
The 1932 launch of Woman's Own heralded the arrival of one of IPC's
traditional 'Big Two', with the appearance of Woman following just five years
later. As the years have followed by IPC started to publish more and more magazines
targeted towards women making the target market for IPC’s magazines a lot more
balanced between the males and females. This will have resulted in more sales and
more interest for IPC’s products being produced as more and more people felt involved
(with their interests) with the magazines. Newnes promoted its first issue of Woman's
Own with a free cover-mounted gift - three skeins of wool with every copy! This

3. was a unique selling point for the magazine as it makes their products individual
and the audience would have felt as though they were getting more for their
money with these complimentary gifts inside the magazine. This would have also
created an increase of interest in IPC’s magazines from the female audience.
Also during the 1930’s, was the first issue of Woman in 1937 cost 2d and was the
first full-colour magazine at that price. Again IPC being one step ahead of the
game thinking into the future so that their magazines were interesting to the
public’s eye. Creating a coloured magazine would indicate that IPC was doing
well financially as a business because they had the funds to print their magazines
in colour and also the confidence to charge ‘2d’ knowing that they would still sell
and market well.
1950’s-1970’s
During the 1950’s came one of/ the most popular magazine that IPC has ever
published… The upsurge in the music scene heralded the arrival of New Musical
Express in 1952 (NME). NME is a pop music magazine containing information about the
genre of music that is being displayed, the first official UK record chart, articles on stars,
music related information etc… All very interesting and new for their audience’s eyes.
This was a new adventure for IPC again as a business not being afraid of taking risks
and trying something new for their audience and it was a hit! The fact that it was a music
magazine makes the magazine have a wider reach for an audience, as both males and
females are interested in music. Also, this could mean that IPC were now trying to target
people from different age groups, there was a lot of younger people who are into
listening to music and reading about the latest hits (which they would first find in NME).
Even targeting groups of people from different ethnic backgrounds as people who are
from different religions may have different taste in the style of music that they listen to.
1969
saw the birth of a new football weekly - Shoot!* - launched to capitalise on the upsurge
of interest in the game generated by England's World Cup victory three years earlier.
After the phenomenal result of England winning the world cup in 1966, this was all that
was talked about for years after as it was such an amazing victory or the country. IPC
noticed that sport was becoming even more of a popular interest for people (especially
males) so they jumped at the opportunity to create a football magazine. The main target
audience for this magazine would have been males but of many different age groups,
although some females would have been interested in this magazine too... Football was
a sport that so many men enjoyed to watch together and talk about so now they had a
magazine to keep up to date with the latest sporting facts and figures. Again a brilliant
idea from IPC, keeping up the times, the audience’s interest’s and widening their reach
to keep the public happy.
The 1980s
IPC announces the formation of European Magazines Ltd., a joint venture
company with Group Marie Claire to launch the UK edition of the international title
Marie Claire in 1988. Marie Claire was a very popular group and business
investment for IPC, this was something new for the company. Joining with this

4. international group was a new challenge for IPC which was a very good business
investment, taking the company out of its comfort zone and trying something
new. Taking their business to an international level shows again that IPC are
stepping up in the market and expanding their horizon for their audience. Their
audience has gone international adding millions of new eyes to read their
products. This also leads to more publicity for the company which will help the
business grow. The more their audiences grow, the more the business will grow.
The 2000s
New millennium, new name - IPC Magazines is renamed IPC Media in 2000, a
new identity to go hand-in-hand with a strategy based on being a brand-centric
business. By now IPC has been a business for over 150 years! By the year 2000
they had accomplished so much as a business so they decided It was time for a
change. As they have covered so many genres of magazines for the media they
came to the decision to rename their company to ‘IPC Media’. This was a big title
for the company as they were no longer just covering magazines, they were
broadening their horizon for different companies to want them to publish their
products. As they have been such a success to that day, they had the confidence
to take a step further in the market. It was a new year and time for a new start.
The 2010s
In January 2010, IPC Media restructured around three key audience groups:
men, mass-market women and up-market women. Over the years IPC have
targeted so many different groups of people and have learnt where the majority of
their popular target audiences are. They have realised that men, mass-market
women and up-market women are where they can target and base their work
upon. They know what magazines to now publish to catch the audience’s eyes as
they have tried such a large variety of different genres of magazines since they
started out as a business. This also shows us that over time men and women
have now become equal compared to in the 1900’s where the only people that
were targeted by IPC were upper class men. To this day, more magazines are
targeted towards women than men on average because stereotypically women
enjoy reading the latest trends and gossip more than men do, hence why two of
the key audience groups are the female gender. This just shows how far the
world has come with equality and how far IPC has come as a company.
2. Why might Times Inc be an appropriate publisher for a new
music magazine?
I feel that IPC would be a suitable company to publish a new music magazine
because of how versatile they have been over the years branching out into writing
about different sectors of the market for their audience. For example they have
written newspapers, Horse&hounding magazines, yachting magazines, women’s
home and garden magazines just to name a few… these are definitely different
genres which shoes me that they have a wide target market who they reach out to

5. as a company. The history of the company demonstrates how they aren’t afraid to
try something new… which makes new magazines confident in IPC’s publishing skills.
During the 18-1900’s, IPC have gradually expanded who they are targeting their
products to. In the early stages of the company, IPC created newspapers about
current facts and stories going on around the world which showed us that their niche
market was upper class men due to them being the dominant sex and being able to
afford these products. As time went on they expanded their horizon and went on to
creating different magazine genres e.g. County Life, Shooting Times, Amateur
Gardening, The Railway Magazine and many more, therefore resulting in a wider
target audience for IPC’s magazines. During the 1920-1940’s, they also started
creating magazines target towards the women ‘Homes and gardens’, this particular
magazine was target at the female gender as stereotypically these were the kind of
topics and hobbies they were interested in. Which results in again IPC’s target
audience expanding even more… Publishing magazines like Marie Claire, Chat and
Mizz* appeals to me because they are international magazines. This shows that IPC
have an international audience to publish their magazines too which would help
promote a new music magazine.
Another reason why IPC would be a good company to publish a new music magazine
is because back in 1952 was the arrival of New Musical Express (NME). Even to this
day, NME is a well-known, worldwide popular music magazine which has been used
for over 50 years of musical enjoyment for generations of people. This is also IPC’s
only published music magazine therefore wouldn’t result in lot of competition for
the new music magazine. With the background success of NME, this would give the
new music magazine’s creator confidence in the fact that IPC can help make this
magazine a major success just like they did for NME.
‘staying true to our mission, we continue to adapt and innovate, making sure our
products are relevant and appealing to the busy consumer who needs to know – but
also wants to be inspired by – what’s going on in the world’. This is a quote that I
have taken from IPC’s website and it explains their mission as a business. This is a
very motivational and determined mission that IPC has for their business. This is
good to read off of their website as it shows that they are confident and are
determined to succeed. This is another reason as to why I think that IPC would be a
good company to publish a new music magazine, it would be a new challenge for
them and as a business they always seemto rise to a challenge. They seem to be
confident in their business therefore it makes people confident in their work too.

6. 3. Sorts of genres of music/types of magazines might they be
likely to publish?
IPC over the years have published such a huge variety of genres of magazines, from
amateur gardening to NME music magazine, IPC has covered a lot. They had the
confidence to take risks and the courage to publish all sorts of different genres of
magazines which were an interest to males, females, upper class, middle class,
working class, different generations of age, different ethnic groups. IPC has done it
all…
In my opinion, I think that the genre of music magazine that IPC are likely to publish
would be a pop magazine. I think this because they have previously published a pop
music magazine, NME, which was a huge success even to this day! So IPC know what
type of people to target and sell this genre of magazine too, they will be confident in
their target audience and selling points. As they have sold this genre of magazine
before, they know what shops to sell the magazines to, where the places that will
buy the magazines in in bulk. After publishing the successful NME magazine IPC have
grown confidence and knowledge about this genre of magazine. Therefore, in the
future if they were to publish a new music magazine (especially a pop magazine)
then they will know where to start to build up the magazines name and help build a
huge target audience for the creator of the magazine. If they have confidence in
themselves and their own work, people looking to pay a publishing company to
publish their magazine will have confidence in them too. Their history over the years
clearly shows how successful they really are as a company.
4. Why might alternative publishers like Bauer be
appropriate? (You need to produce a general historical
breakdown of Bauer before you answer the question)
In 1875 the lithographer Lodolph Bauer laid the foundations for the global media
company with a print shop for business cards in Hamburg, Germany.
Aged only 23 he set up a printing plant to produce business cards. He then launched
a local advertising newspaper ‘Rothenburgersorter Zeitung’.
This was the first product that Bauer ever created. In the 1870’s the male gender
was the more powerful and dominant sex during this era, therefore the newspaper
would have been targeted towards the men. This is because during those times
women were seen as less intellectual than men and weren’t important enough to
keep up with the times like the men were, they were only ‘housewives’. Also during
this time personally, I thought that upper class men were the main niche market for

7. this newspaper due to the fact that people of a lower class may not be educated
enough or even be able to afford this product.
In 1926 then followed ‘Extrablatt am Montag’ and eventually ‘Rundfunk-Kritik’ (a
radio magazine) which quickly reached sales of over half a million copies a week!
This tells us that Bauer’s first product must have been a huge success for them to
then bring out two new products for the public to read. After selling a phenomenal
amount of copies (over half a million) Bauer was off to a good start as a company.
They were starting to broaden their genres of newspapers so that they could keep
their audience interested and so that the company kept up to date with the times.
Again because it was still only the 1920’s, I believe that the male gender was still the
main target audience for these newspapers. Because newspapers are based on facts
and figures upper classed men are the most likely to be more knowledgeable to
understand and enjoy the content that they were reading therefore they would carry
on to buy more copies of the following products thereafter. Due to the fact that
these products were published almost 40 years later there is a possibility that
different classed men (e.g. middle class) would now be interested in buying the
newspapers. This was all working in Bauer’s favour creating more income for them
so that they could continue to grow as a publishing company.
The publishing company works its way to the top after the second world war with
listing guides and youth magazines. Rasslebande sells 300,000 copies every fortnight,
TV Horen und Sehen reaches one million readers. Quick, Revue and bravo became
firm fixtures in every German household. As the years were passing by Bauer was
sailing through the years working higher up the scale and pushing the company to its
limits so that they would reach their maximum potential. By doing that they again
published more magazines but this time started targeting different age groups as
target audiences. ‘Youth magazines’, the word youth shows us that they were
writing these magazines for the younger generation of people hoping to build up a
new range of target audience to broaden their market.
In the 1970’s, the first weekly women’s magazine is created with Tina and Bella. We
can see that the times are changing so Bauer are keeping up with the times and how
the world is changing. This is a good change for the company as it is a new challenge
that they can rise to and expanding their audience even further! Creating a women’s
magazine was a big change in the market, men were no longer the only privileged
sex, women now had something to look forward too as well. Although Bauer’s target
market for this particular magazine was women and not men, their overall audience
is now not just men but unisex. This creates more of an income for the business
again enabling them to expand as a business with their finances growing higher and
higher. The fact that the magazine was also created by two women, gives the
magazines a woman’s touch. This means that it would have red better for women as

8. it was wrote by women. They can relate and understand what women’s wants and
desires were at that point in time making the magazine a lot more specific and
interesting for their audience.
In 1981, great grandson Heinz Heinrich Bauer drives the internationalism of the
company by launching ‘Women’s world’ as the first weekly women’s magazine in the
USA- a million-selling success! The British and Polish markets followed in 1987 and
1991. So at this point in time Bauer had now got enough attention, audience variety
and funding to turn their company international! This was a big moment in the
company’s history as it would have changed forever… This was a huge responsibility
for the company and for the great grandson to take on but they weren’t afraid of
hard work and commitment to their media products. This meant for the company
that they would achieve a mass amount of new audiences wanting to buy and read
their magazine’s. During this time the target audience for the magazine ‘Women’s
World’ was obviously women, middle aged, working/middle/upper classed women.
Dominating the market with women’s magazines because they came to realise as a
company that women’s magazine’s was a huge selling point and success for them as
a business, this is why this magazine was taken internationally. Women tend to be
more interested in reading facts and figures about themselves, their lifestyles,
wellbeing etc… Therefore, creating a huge marketing opportunity for the company.
This also tells us that ‘Womens World’ was a success in the USA hence the why it
went on to being sold in the UK and Poland a few years later.
In the year 2000 came the launch in the U.K. of the famous magazine HEAT naturally
including the online portal ‘heatworld.com’ and the station heat radio. As the times
have been moving on new technology was coming into play with Bauer, keeping up
to date with all the latest trands. HEAT, still to this day a very famous magazine, was
an amazing hit for the company, selling millions of copies all over. Personally I think
this magazine’s target audience was towards middle class women as the magazine
contains a lot of everyday life knowledge, facts on celebrities and different topics
that stereotypically women are interested in. Bauer probably noticed that by the
year 2000 equality in the world became a lot more equally balanced between males
and females, the women were no longer subordinate beneath the men. Therefore,
targeting women was probably a better and easier challenge for the company, but it
makes life easier for them knowing that the world was more of an open place to
ideas and tastes in different topics. Also because HEAT was such a hit with the
public, their own magazine was created and even a radio station! This magazine was
flying through the crowds as it became more and more popular each day.

9. Today Bauer media group is constantly developing new people, women’s and food
magazine – always in line with tastes of our widely varying target groups. Latest titles
include: Closer, Meins, MYWAY, Joy, shape and most famously Cosmopolitan. Today
we hear a lot about Baures magazines, especially Cosmopolitan, which just shows
how far they have come as a company. Over the years they have covered such a
large range of magazine genres to entertain their different target audiences. They
have always managed to keep up with the world of media and keep on top of the
game hence the success that they have achieved today. The magazines above are
just to name a few of Bauer’s successes. I still feel as though the majority of
magazines that have been created are targeted more towards women nowadays in
contrast to 1875 where it all began. Stereotypically women are more likely to
buy/read magazines so this is why publishes publish so many females driven
magazines to keep their audience up to date and intrigued. Bauer has been a major
success.
B) After researching and creating a history breakdown of IPC and Bauer, in my
opinion I think that Bauer would be a more suitable publishing company to publish a
new music magazine.
One reason why I think that Bauer would be a more suitable publishing company for
a new music magazine would be how many successful magazines they have
published over the years and the opportunities that then followed after. For
example, HEAT magazine was an extremely popular magazine internationally which
was one of Bauer’s most successful business plans. After the success of heat
followed a website for the magazine and also a radio station. This just shows how
much time and effort Bauer put in for HEAT magazine for it then to become so
popular to branch into different business ventures. Although on the other hand IPC
covered a lot of different niche markets since they started out. For example,
publishing magazines like ‘Amateur Gardening, Cycling weekly, Yachting world’ just
to name a few. This was a good business plan because it shows that IPC weren’t
afraid of trying something new and out of their comfort zone. But for me I feel like
because Bauer made HEAT create different business opportunities other than a
magazine shows that they’re one step ahead of the game. Planning the ideas of
tomorrow today.
Both companies have published some extremely successful magazines like NME from
IPC and Cosmopolitan and HEAT from Bauer, both companies would do an amazing
job at publishing a new music magazine. But one final reason why I feel as though
Bauer would be a more suitable publishing company for a new music magazine
would be the fact that they are still open to different target market groups to this
day. Although they know that middle classed women would probably be the most

10. popular way forward for them, they haven’t set a business plan to focus on three
specific target market groups unlike IPC who are particularly focused on: men, mass
– market women and up market women. So in my opinion if these are they particular
focus for IPC’s future, where will a new music magazine fit in? Personally I that a new
music magazine’s target market would be for slightly younger people who like to
keep up to date with all the latest music trends and the top 40 hits. Bauer may have
more of an opportunity to make this magazine successful. Also since IPC already
have such a successful music magazine NME, they may not have room in their
market to publish another one to bring keep it on par.
Those are a few reasons as to why I feel like Bauer would be a more successful
publishing company for a new music magazine.