In Post-Print Era, Glamour EIC Focuses on Building a Site Women Will Pay to Visit
*By Carlo Versano*
As digital advertising is increasingly beholden to the Google/Facebook duopoly, Glamour is experimenting with what it sees as the future of the industry: a multi-faceted revenue model that uses a combination of traditional ads, metered or niche paywalls, events, audio and e-commerce, even as it kills off its one-time moneymaker, the monthly print edition.
Samantha Barry, Glamour's editor-in-chief, told Cheddar in an interview Wednesday that she sees the 80-year-old iconic brand as a "service for women," and wants it to be a place where they can consume relevant content and shop for relevant products on a regular basis.
The site was redesigned with that ambition in mind, and unveiled to users this week.
"In the digital world, what's valuable is not the 'one and dones,'" she said, referring to readers who click on a single piece of content and then leave the site. "It's the habit."
Glamour made the decision to discontinue its regular print edition late last year in order to focus on this model, which Barry said is already showing promise. She mentioned that video views have grown by triple-digits, thanks in part to a strong YouTube presence, and the newly redesigned Glamour.com now sees 85 percent of its traffic from mobile.
Just last week, Glamour cut several staff members, including its executive beauty editor of five years. But according to Barry, the magazine has no plans as of now to continue the layoffs.
"We're actually doing some hiring," Barry said.
With Glamour parent Condé Nast recently announcing that it would put its entire stable of titles behind a paywall by the end of the year, Barry noted that not all paywalls are created equal. Some titles institute metered paywalls to great effect ー The New Yorker, another Condé title, for example ー while others have built adaptive paywalls that decide when a reader has read enough for free (see The Wall Street Journal), and still others have put up blanket paywalls (see the FT). For Glamour, it could be entirely different still, Barry said, mentioning a possible niche paywall for specific verticals.
For a paywall to be successful, the underlying brand needs to be rock solid in the minds of readers. "They'll pay for content that they really think is worthy," Barry said.
The addition of an e-commerce revenue stream makes sense for Glamour readers, according to Barry. They're already coming to the brand for advice on beauty and fashion products, which is why she prioritized that element in the site's redesign.
"The shoppability of the site was a really important thing for us," she said. "In the last quarter, our shoppable galleries increased by 250 percent."
For full interview [click here](https://cheddar.com/videos/glamour-gets-digital-makeover).
Joe Cecela, Dream Exchange CEO, explains how they are aiming to form the first minority-controlled company to operate an exchange in U.S. history. Watch!
A Michigan judge is putting sponges in the hands of shoplifters and ordering them to wash cars in a Walmart parking lot when spring weather arrives. Genesee County Judge Jeffrey Clothier hopes the unusual form of community service discourages people from stealing from Walmart. The judge also wants to reward shoppers with free car washes. Clothier says he began ordering “Walmart wash” sentences this week for shoplifting at the store in Grand Blanc Township. He believes 75 to 100 people eventually will be ordered to wash cars this spring. Clothier says he will be washing cars alongside them when the time comes.
The State Department had been in talks with Elon Musk’s Tesla company to buy armored electric vehicles, but the plans have been put on hold by the Trump administration after reports emerged about a potential $400 million purchase. A State Department spokesperson said the electric car company owned by Musk was the only one that expressed interest back in May 2024. The deal with Tesla was only in its planning phases but it was forecast to be the largest contract of the year. It shows how some of his wealth has come and was still expected to come from taxpayers.
At 100 years old, the Goodyear Blimp is an ageless star in the sky. The 246-foot-long airship will be in the background of the Daytona 500 — flying roughly 1,500 feet above Daytona International Speedway, actually — to celebrate its greatest anniversary tour. Even though remote camera technologies are improving regularly and changing the landscape of aerial footage, the blimp continues to carve out a niche. At Daytona, with the usual 40-car field racing around a 2½-mile superspeedway, views from the blimp aptly provide the scope of the event.
You'll just have to wait for interest rates (and prices) to go down. Plus, this deal's a steel, the big carmaker wedding is off, and bribery is back, baby!
It’s a chicken-and-egg problem: Restaurants are struggling with record-high U.S. egg prices, but their omelets, scrambles and huevos rancheros may be part of the problem. Breakfast is booming at U.S. eateries. First Watch, a restaurant chain that serves breakfast, brunch and lunch, nearly quadrupled its locations over the past decade to 570. Fast-food chains like Starbucks and Wendy's added more egg-filled breakfast items. In normal times, egg producers could meet the demand. But a bird flu outbreak that has forced them to slaughter their flocks is making supplies scarcer and pushing up prices. Some restaurants like Waffle House have added a surcharge to offset their costs.
William Falcon, CEO and Founder of Lightning AI, discusses the ongoing feud between Elon Musk and Sam Altman, and how everyday people can use AI in their lives.
