- editorial policy... who is Jacqui Thom?... may be i know her from her 5 minutes at citizen but to reach a wider audience you have to go for someone well known... this 'high society' has too few people in Kenya... the real high society pays $20 for a UK or US mag

- bkismat... you do not even qualify for that college you attend... 100-200/= can't even cover bus fare for a day to and from most parts of nairobi

- @ 250-280 ($ 4) these mags were well affordable.. it all went down to product quality... information by definition is = tell me something i don't know...

- of course the SA factor...

Consumer Insight and other such bodies do the research year after year lakini people do not read them. The bulk of Kenya's population is poor.

There are yuppies who speak good English, have flashy cars, hang out at Carnivore, go for weekends to Naivasha and Nanyuki, Holiday in Mombasa and occassionally fly out of the country. You get one of these to run a business and they think everyone is like that because that is the kind of people they hang out with. They start to mass produce a product for this segment and then discover to their astonishment that they are not that many. Some businesses learn and adapt (read Safaricom with introduction of lower and lower denominations for airtime, Wahindi companies that sell "mafuta ya kupima" etc) others fail or are unable to adapt and close shop (read Barnetts, Supreme etc).

You should hear young executives talking about "quality" and "international standards" and forgetting that their target consumer doesn't give a rat's ass about those. They want something that serves the purpose and is affordable. In the case of magazines I imagine the publishers of True Love and Drum may have scoffed at the quality of "Parents" and thought they could do much better. Have you ever wondered why the gutter press with with its poor quality paper and horrible grammar survive? They have understood their audience. They provide juicy stories at a price that is affordable and they will be here long after the high quality, glossy cover and stylish True Love is gone.

As the middle class grows maybe there will be demand enough to sustain these kinds of publications but for now we will have to do with "Citizen" and "Parents".

hata mimi nimesadikika.

kusadikika - powerful points. hadn't thought about parents. she must be doing something right. the magazine name itself is genius. from a certain age, you would rather be seen reading a magazine called 'parents' and leave 'true love' to teenagers. never mind the racy headlines on both.

I think there are enough of the so called yuppies in Kenya to keep EAM's publications profitable.I am sure Angola, Nigeria and Uganda are no better than us in terms of buying power yet media 24's operations in those countries have not been affected.
I think it boils down to content. True love for instance got too monotonous. even the cover personality was telling- same old media personalities.