Hearst and Meredith are “Unbound” and “EatingWell”

Media brands competing in the still-hot fashion/beauty and women's lifestyle categories are heating up with the latest moves by Hearst and Meredith. 

Hearst’s new campaign, “Unbound,” brings together all of Hearst’s titles such as Esquire and Good Housekeeping into one, with the forward-tilting “d” representative of all things digital.

“We’re unleashing our brand DNA… we said, O.K., let’s step back, take a look at who we are and what Hearst Magazines now represents,” commented Michael Clinton, president for marketing and publishing director at Hearst Magazines, to the New York Times.

After a series of costly investments, from the $892 million acquisition of 100 Lagardère publications, to the $325 million purchase of digital agency iCrossing, and a JV with Scripps Network Interactive on Food Network Magazine, Hearst is revving up for even more, testing an HGTV Magazine and “e-commerce initiatives coming up this fall” according to Clinton.

“Unbound” includes print ads with scannable QR codes that read, “Scan this QR code to experience all 19 of our iconic brands — any time, any way,” taxicab signage, digital ads, posters in the windows of the Hearst building, and a billboard in Times Square. 

The campaign, created internally with consulting work from Co Collective runs through year’s end.

Hearst's magazine competitor Meredith, meanwhile, just acquired the EatingWell Media Group, a multichannel brand focused on healthy eating, and has launched Recipe.com, pairing recipes with digital coupons.

“Food is our top advertising category,” said Meredith Chairman and CEO Steve Lacy in a press release. “In acquiring EatingWell and launching Recipe.com, we’ve added two anchor brands to serve the 75 million American women we engage every month, and the marketers that want to reach them.”

The EatingWell portfolio includes: 

• A bi-monthly magazine with a circulation of 350,000 

• A content-rich website with healthy recipes, food and shopping tips, and meal preparation

• A content licensing and custom marketing program providing diet and nutrition articles to 75 plus clients including consumer portals, healthcare, food and supermarket retail partners

• A Healthy-in-a-Hurry mobile recipe app 

“Our goal is to create a multi-revenue food platform that aligns with the modern way women plan, shop and prepare meals for their families,” said Liz Schimel, the former Comcast and Nokia exec who is Meredith's Chief Digital Officer.  

The Recipe.com portfolio includes: 

• A dynamic website with 20,000 plus recipes, featuring in-store and manufacturer coupons, how-to videos, recipes from best-selling cook books, partner recipes, an online shopping list and recipe box 

• A magazine with distribution of 350,000 at a cover price of $5.99

• A mobile web feature that provides recipe and meal-planning content

• Social media outreach through Meredith’s branded sites on Facebook and Twitter

• Branded television segments airing weekly on Meredith’s syndicated TV program, Better

• Quarterly onsert promotions featuring custom content and coupons poly-bagged in Meredith’s monthly magazines.

The official charity of Recipe.com is Share Our Strength, dedicated to ending childhood hunger in America by 2015 through its No Kid Hungry Campaign. Meredith makes donations to Share Our Strength from special offers on Recipe.com