Mag guessing game

Harper’s Bazaar in no hurry to fill top post

HEARST magazines President Troy Young and Chief Content Officer Kate Lewis appear to be casting a wide net as the company searches for a successor to Glenda Bailey at Harper’s Bazaar.

That suggests the muckety-mucks at Hearst don’t have an evident successor for Harper’s longtime editor-in-chief and are embarking on what could be a long search.

Bailey stepped down on Wednesday after 19 years as the editor-in-chief.

She will stay on at the mag as global fashion consultant for the Bazaar brands worldwide.

WWD on Thursday advanced three potential successors: Stella Bugbee, editor of The Cut at New York Media, who was reportedly upset she was passed over as editor-in-chief at New York Magazine when Adam Moss left; Kristina O’Neill, a former executive editor at Harper’s Bazaar who is now the editor of WSJ Magazine; and Joyann King, who is the executive editor of HB’s Web site.

“They will be on the list, but there will be others as well,” said one knowledgeable source of the search, suggesting Hearst, which did not hire an outside head hunter, is in no particular hurry.

King, the inside candidate, was tipped as the early front-runner but, since no immediate replacement was named, she may actually have no better odds of landing the job than the outside candidates.

The only consensus appears to be that the new hire will have to have considerably more digital skills than Bailey, whose exit had been rumored for months.

“They’re holding onto her advertising contacts,” said one source of Bailey.

“She was extremely talented and had a great eye, but was notoriously nondigital.”

Pot retail pivot

There’s more executive turmoil at High times Holding Inc., which lost its third chief financial officer in less than a year just as it was unveiling plans to license its first two cannabis retail stores in Las Vegas and Los Angeles.

The deal for the stores, which still must get regulatory approval, will operate under the High Times name. The company said in an SEC filing Thursday that it has “binding letters of intent with holders of dispensary licenses” in both cities.

The retailing push is a dramatic pivot for thefinancially struggling publisher of High Times and Dope magazines that was also running trade shows and exhibitions for pot enthusiasts.

The company alsorevealed in an SEC filing that it has named a new president: Paul Henderson, former CEO of pot retailer Grupo Fl or, who will do double duty as the acting CFO. Prior to Grupo Flor, Henderson was said to have served stints at Apple and Goldman Sachs.

David Newberg, who had taken on the CFO job following the sudden departure of Neil Watanabe in July after only three months, re signed on Jan .7 after five months on the job.

Henderson was signed the following day to a $300,000- a-year job as president.

His hiring comes less than a month after the Christmas Eve resignation of CEO Kraig Fox after just nine months. Fox, a former executivewith Dick Clark Productions, was replaced by former Overstock CEO Stormy Simon.

The company has been struggling to do an initial public offering since August 2018 through what is known as a Reg A+ filing, which is aimed at small cap companies and has less stringent requirements than a conventional IPO.

But the company has had to repeatedly extend its IPO offering and has warned in its regulatory filings that the stock is highly risky and only investors who could afford to lose everything should invest.

Still, Henderson thinks the retail push will lead it to the promised land. “There is no brand in cannabis that compares to High times ,” he said.

Adam Levin, the head of the investment firm Oreva Capital that owns High times, could not be reached for comment.

Buyout details

Voluntary buy out packages that Tribune Publishing is dangling for employees will be capped at 52 weeks.

Tribune Publishing CEO Tim Knight told staffers at the New York Daily News, Chicago Tribune, Baltimore Sun and other papers that voluntary buyouts will be offered to employees with eight or more years experience but had offered no further details on Monday. Now the details are coming out. The packages being offered to non-union employees are for two -weeks pay for year one, oneweek pay for years two through eight, “and two weeks for all years after nine years of service—witha max of 52 weeks,” said a source. Existing workers can choose to take it in a lump sum or biweekly and keep insurance,” this person said. Papers that are unionized have yet to nail down final details.

Insiders are said to be particularly nervous that the voluntary buyouts will be followed by in voluntary cuts. Alden Global Capital, branded a “destroyer of local media,” owns 32 percent of Tribune Publishing stock.