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Pittsburgh Magazine sold to Colorado company
A Colorado-based publishing company said Friday it acquired Pittsburgh Magazine from WQED Multimedia and may start other regional publications, along with buying magazines in other cities.
WiesnerMedia said Pittsburgh Magazine will continue to operate in the city and readers will see no changes.
The magazine will continue a partnership with WQED that includes the "On Air" section in every issue with the station's TV and radio lineups. WQED members who pledge at least $40 a year will continue to receive it.
"This is the first brick in the build-out of a regional media company and Pittsburgh is the perfect place to start," CEO Dan Wiesner said.
Wiesner said his company has owned regional magazines in the past in Denver and other markets. "We like the category, and we like the city," he said, adding, "It's a great time to be buying stuff because there is not a lot of activity" in publishing industry deals.
WiesnerMedia, based in Greenwood Village, Colo., runs about a dozen consumer, trade and custom magazines for hotels, associations and other entities. The company's purchase of Pittsburgh Magazine includes its annual City Guide, Home and Garden Magazine and Pittsburgh Weddings.
In the Pittsburgh region, he said, he hopes to expand the local magazine's online presence and develop other publications as extensions of it. The company plans to acquire city and regional magazines in other markets, he said.
George L. Miles Jr., chief executive of WQED, said while the company has cut costs to respond to declining funding for public broadcasting, "This wasn't a budgetary move. It was a strategic decision to focus on the business we need to do over the long term, which is electronic media."
Pittsburgh Magazine will remain at WQED's headquarters in Oakland for the next several months at least and 18 of the 21 staff members will be kept on, Miles said. The other jobs duplicate positions in Colorado, he said.
The magazine began in 1969 as QED Renaissance. Publisher Betsy Benson said paid subscriptions total 51,249, but readership is estimated at more than 380,000.
Pittsburgh Magazine was one of the last publications to break away from its roots with public broadcasting stations. "Public TV stations had an important role in the formation of the city magazine industry," she said, but most of the magazines are independently owned.
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