Trouble growing in Rodale’s new Organic Life
RODALE’S Organic Life, one of the few launches from a major publisher this year, has lost its original publisher only five months after its debut.
Publisher Ellen Carucci’s last day was Wednesday. She said she’s jumping to a new job at Manifest Media next week.
The magazine is seen as a pet project of Chairwoman Maria Rodale, who is the thirdgeneration family member to run the familyowned publishing empire — and who hired Jim Oseland from Saveur as its first editor.
“It was a great offer, and it was a tough call to leave [Rodale’s Organic Life], because I believe very passionately in the mission and Jim’s editorial vision,” Carucci told Media Ink in an email on Thursday.
The title grew out of one of the company’s flagships, the now shuttered Organic Gardening. The strategy of rolling OG’s 330,000name subscription base into the new magazine helped hold down ROL’s circulation costs.
But one source speculated that the magazine was having a hard time bridging the gap from its old base — which had seen doubledigit declines in ads — to a new one that seeks to bring in more upscale, luxury advertisers.
“Maybe she was having a hard time selling upscale advertisers on articles about whizzing on your peas,” said one former Rodalian, alluding to a recent ROL article that attracted a fair amount of attention: “Why You Should Pee on Your Plants: Discover the incredible benefit of urine in the backyard.”
ROL aims to meld food, shelter, gardening, wellness and good living into its editorial mission.
A company spokeswoman said, “We have a number of new advertisers across a number of new categories” and signed Subaru as the sponsor of its Farm2Fork event to be staged in Williamsburg next month. “We’re very pleased with how Rodale’s Organic Life is performing,” the spokeswoman said.
A search for a new publisher is underway, she said.
Nylon $ man
Nylon Media, publisher of an edgy fashion magazine and digital platforms, has tapped a replacement for its shortlived former chief revenue officer.
The new CRO is Sean Cullinane, formerly vice president of sales at Crisp Media. He replaces Carrie Reynolds, an executive who came from bridal publisher XO Media in April and left in July.
Cullinane apparently arrived quietly two weeks ago, an appointment by Diversis Capital Chairman Marc Luzzatto — who is also chairman of Nylon — to bring in more digital expertise.
Michelle Lee, who was named editorinchief in late 2014, recently added chief marketing officer to her title as the company aims to amp up its native advertising.
But the business side has been in a state of flux for some time, even before it was sold to Diversis by Donald Hellinger’s Quadra Media in May 2014.
Hellinger and associates had ac quired controlling interest from the husbandandwife founders, Jaclynn and Marvin Scott Jarrett. The sale was hastened because Hellinger was in a federal prison at the time on a moneylaundering charge (which was unrelated to his media holdings).
The Jarretts have since gone on to found a new digital pop culture operation, Popular, but are still angry at their old partners and the new owners, claiming that the title was sold against their will.
They had a 49 percent stake but were blindsided when the majority owner sold it out from under them.
A California state court judge turned down a motion by the Jarretts to grant a restraining order that would have rescinded the sale. The judge instead urged the feuding parties to try to reach an outofcourt settlement.
SI in film biz
Time Inc. is taking another step to diversify its offerings. It plans to release six new films for desktop and mobile consumption before yearend via its newly unveiled Sports Illustrated Films division.
On Thursday, it unveiled the first two titles: “The Rise and Fall of the Danbury Trashers,” which grew out of an SI article in 2014 on a minorleague hockey team by Jon Wertheim; and “Brett Favre: Life After the Game,” on the former Green Bay Packers superstar.
Insiders Wertheim, Ian Orefice and Collin Orcutt have been tapped as the executive producers of SI Films.
Time magazine actually got the ball rolling in the video realm last year with about a halfdozen movies that debuted under Red Border Films. The SI venture is seen as a more ambitious undertaking. One of the films expected to be released before yearend is “100 Greatest Moments in Sports.”
Also in the works is a movie — “Patrick and ’Zo” — on two former Georgetown stars, Patrick Ewing and Alonzo Mourning, who became fierce rivals in the NBA.
Time Inc. is teaming up with Mandalay Sports Media and Velocity to produce the SI Films programming.