Home design magazine Domino is undergoing a renaissance, back on the market with a fantastic new magazine after being shuttered by Conde Nast in 2009.
Mr. Magazine recently spoke to Beth Brenner, Domino’s chief revenue officer, about why their title focuses on print as its primary delivery vehicle and how their readers use the content.
“You know what, I’m getting old and I love reading paper. And I love cozying up with it. I do think it’s unique to this category. I think when you’re home it’s a process and you start it, and you need ideas and inspiration, you tear things out and you look for months and months, if not years before you can make a decision or define your own style.”
She goes on to make the point that print magazine editors are curators; they narrow down the thousands of choices available to a manageable selection. A good magazine provides the context for the content and this is the value it brings to the reader.
She explains, “If you want to find nice rooms on the web you can do it but… I recently renovated part of my house and we wanted to look at bathrooms and I went on to House.com and I researched modern bathrooms and I had to look through 6,000 images. People want curation and they want things to be edited for them. There’s too much out there and that’s what magazines do. That’s what magazine editors do.
The title comes with a hefty $11.99 price tag at the newsstand, and Brenner insists that is part of the brand too.
“So the reason for the high cover price, and I love talking about this cover price, is because in all of my years in the business people have said to us, ‘What’s wrong with you people? Why are you only charging $1 an issue for a subscription and only $3.50 on the newsstands? Don’t you think people will pay for this?’ Agency people say this to us all the time. It just devalues your brand when you sell it for so little and I couldn’t agree more.”
Seems they have both great business sense and a fantastic understanding of the value of print behind them. We wish Domino best of the luck in their new iteration, and will be watching their brand with interest.
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