• by Erik Sass  @eriksass1, June 14, 2013

Amid declining ad pages and stagnant or declining circulation, you don’t hear much nowadays about big new consumer magazine launches -- but Bauer Publishing, the German company behind InTouch Weekly, is apparently unfazed, as it unveiled plans to launch not one but three new magazines.
 
The biggest new addition to the Bauer portfolio is Closer, a celebrity weekly targeting women in their mid-30s and 40s, which will launch in November with a promotional newsstand price of just $0.25, per the New York Post. After gaining a foothold, Bauer plans to raise the price to $3.99 per issue. Editor in chief Annabel Vered was quoted by the newspaperas describing Closer as a “hybrid of a celebrity weekly and women’s service magazine,” mixing news about stars with service journalism.
 
Bauer is also planning to launch Girl’s World, targeting girls ages six to 10, debuting in October with a publication schedule of seven times per year and a newsstand price of $4.99.

Finally, the company plans to launch Celebrations, a Woman’s World spinoff, which will appear six times a year around holidays. It will debut in August with a newsstand price of $4.99.
 
While new magazines are always launching, they’re not usually of a scale to compete with existing incumbents like the glossies which dominate the celebrity weekly category. But Bauer may see an opening in the troubles of established titles.

People’s newsstand sales fell 12.2% from 1,106,244 in the first half of 2011 to 971,668 in the first half of 2012, according to the Alliance for Audited Media, while Us Weekly saw newsstand sales fall 14.6% from 618,491 to 528,027, Life & Style Weekly slipped 19.1% from 378,758 to 306,352, and Star fell 21% from 437,199 to 345,565 over the same period .