'NYT' Consolidates Sunday Supplements

By: Aimee Deeken (Mediaweek) With new editors at the helm, The New York Times Magazine's supplements are getting a complete overhaul: a new editorial concept and rebranded look and identity. The "Part 2s" -- Fashions of the Times, Men's Fashions of the Times, Style & Entertaining, Home Design -- each publish twice a year as glossy Sunday newspaper inserts. Beginning in August, the supplements will be titled T: The New York Times Style Magazine.

"We've taken eight separate issues, 600 individual edit pages, and created from them a modern, luxury style magazine," said Gerry Marzorati, who was named editor of the Times Magazine last September.

"Each supplement had a different editor and mindset," said Stefano Tonchi, who was hired in December from Hearst Magazines' Esquire to rework the supplements. "There was no consistency in the way they approached the product." To create a more fluid publication and single identity for the group, Tonchi first created a shared logo. The revamp also uses a shared, more clean design template that brings the supplements closer to the weekly magazine's tone and look. Each issue will also offer departments such as The Goods and The Mix, along with regular columns from stylists and journalists. The issues' previous themes on design, fashion and food will now inhabit the feature well, though from a more broad and journalistic angle, addressing how such topics influence the culture at large.

"Making a family of lifestyle magazines with more of a style element lends itself to be more appealing to more people," said Jane Deery, president of PGR Media, who buys for Tommy Hilfiger. "They can go a little further in advertising and editorial than in the past."

The New York Times' Sunday circ was 1.67 million through March 31, according to the Audit Bureau of Circulations, essentially flat from a year ago. The Part 2s represent 24% of the Times Magazine's ad pages, according to a Times representative. Ad pages through March were up 8.4% to 838 pages, according to the Publishers' Information Bureau.