"Jobs axed with American FHM..."

Around 40 Emap staff will lose their jobs as a result of the closure of the US edition of FHM.

Paul Keenan, the chief executive of Emap Consumer Media, blamed deteriorating US trading conditions for making the title unprofitable, and said there was no prospect of an upturn in its fortunes.
A total of 47 staff will be affected, but a small number will remain to manage the US FHM website, which will continue to operate.
"Trading conditions in the US market have deteriorated over the past 12 months and we do not expect an improvement in the near term. In these circumstances, we do not anticipate that the title would be able to trade on a profitable basis going forward," Mr Keenan said.
"This decision does not affect FHM UK or any of the 30 other editions currently published around the world.

The US title sells around 1.25m copies a month. However, the US mainstream men's market - including Maxim and Stuff - has suffered a steep decline in ad volumes over recent months.
In the 12 months to October 2006, the three men's titles lost 11% of ad volume, the equivalent of 300 pages a month.
The March edition of the US FHM will be its last when it goes on sale in the new year.
FHM's US edition is also the biggest-selling of any of the 30 versions of the title around the world.

The UK version of the magazine remains the market leader in this country, but its circulation of 420,688 in the first half of 2006 was 24.9% down on the second half of last year.

My Comments...

This article talks about 'top' mens' magazine 'FHM' and it's surprising downfall in my opinion. This particular story talks about the fact that 'FHM' has been withdrawn from shelves in the US even though it has 30 other titles all over the world - what could be the problem? This article also reveals that sales have dropped for competing mens' magazines of the same genre such as 'Maxim' and 'Stuff'. I can't think of many reasons why this may be happening in the US currently...perhaps guys have other ways of entertaining themselves such as websites or downloads which are free?
Personally, I'm quite shocked by this article...it's just not something that I would expect I guess - especially since such things usually begin in the US and are then introduced to the rest of the world...