Brandon Holley Hire Shows How Conde Nast Plans to Get Lucky
Reading about the dumping of founding editor Kim France from Condé Nast's Lucky magazine, in favor of the new model -- Yahoo (and former Condé Nast exec) Brandon Holley -- is another sign that change has finally come to the print-centric world of Condé Nast.
But it's not just about Holley's intriguing mix of digital and print credentials; she once helmed the defunct Condé Nast title Jane, and her most recent gig has been as editor-in-chief of Shine, a Yahoo (YHOO) women's site that boasts upwards of 20 million visitors a month. What's even more interesting here is that Lucky, a book wholly devoted to the joy of shopping, seems superlatively positioned to play off the publishing company's new aspirations, until now best exemplified by the naming of consumer marketing head Robert Sauerberg to president in late July, and, several weeks later, Viacom's (VIA) Joe Simon as the company's first CTO reporting to Sauerberg. The goal of Sauerberg's appointment is to make consumer revenue roughly half of Conde Nast's business.
Add it all up, and it's obvious what the next step is for Lucky. Even though it's not exactly a marquee title at Condé Nast, it is uniquely positioned for the company to experiment with a much more robust merger of editorial and e-commerce. (Right now, the union is nothing more than run-of-the-mill.) Lucky will be a peek into the future of Condé Nast. While marrying commerce and content is not something all of the company's titles can -- or should -- do, for titles such as Glamour, Details and Vogue the merger makes sense. (Check out my colleague, Lydia Dishman's, post on the new Vogue.com.)
Recently, Condé Nast launched an iPad app for Glamour, which has an e-commerce component built-in. But, to my dismay, the company admitted at the time it was not getting a cut of sales generated via the app. My guess is that with new sheriffs in town -- Sauerberg, Simon and now Holley -- that's about to change.
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