Hearst and Rodale have announced that Hearst has agreed to acquire the magazine and book businesses of Rodale, the global health and wellness content company based in New York and Emmaus, Pennsylvania.
The announcement was made by Hearst President and CEO Steven Swartz, Rodale CEO Maria Rodale and Hearst Magazines President David Carey. The transaction is expected to close in early 2018, following receipt of necessary government approvals. Terms were not disclosed.
The move by Hearst will significantly consolidate the magazine and book publishing market, particularly in the US. The intended acquisition of Rodale follows an announcement by Rodale this summer that it was exploring strategic options, including a possible sale.
With 93 editions in 64 countries, Rodale publishes ‘the largest, most established health and wellness lifestyle brands’, including Men’s Health, Women’s Health, Prevention, Rodale’s Organic Life, Runner’s World and Bicycling; while Rodale Books is known for titles including Former US Vice President Al Gore’s An Inconvenient Truth, Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz’s Onward and Dave Asprey’s The Bulletproof Diet. The division’s highly successful series include Thug Kitchen, Wheat Belly and The South Beach Diet.
Upon completion of the acquisition, Rodale’s multi-platform content business will be managed by Hearst Magazines, a unit of Hearst with more than 300 editions and websites around the world, including 20 titles in the US.
Commenting on the announcement, Hearst President David Carey said “Maria Rodale has grown her family’s business into a peerless authority that reaches an enormous audience. Hearst and Rodale are already publishing partners around the world, including the UK, the Netherlands and Japan, and we’ve seen first-hand how the content resonates. We are pleased to add them and all of Rodale’s brands to our vibrant and varied global portfolio, providing readers with dependable information and offering marketers unbeatable scale and a trustworthy environment in the increasingly important health and wellness space.”
Maria Rodale said “We have a long-standing respect for Hearst’s commitment to connecting consumers with imaginative, engaging content across an ever-diversifying choice of platforms, technologies and experiences around the world. We believe our exceptional brands, businesses and employees will thrive in this culture of innovation and we are confident that Hearst’s stewardship will continue to grow the passionate and purpose-driven communities that Rodale has built over the past 70 years.”
Allen & Company acted as financial advisor to Rodale in its sale and Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz acted as legal advisor.
Hearst is a diversified media, information and services company with more than 360 businesses. Its major interests include ownership in cable television networks such as A&E, HISTORY, Lifetime and ESPN; majority ownership of global ratings agency Fitch Group; Hearst Health, a group of medical information and services businesses; 30 television stations such as WCVB-TV in Boston and KCRA-TV in Sacramento, California, which reach a combined 19% of US viewers; newspapers such as the Houston Chronicle, San Francisco Chronicle and Albany Times Union, and nearly 300 magazines around the world. These include Cosmopolitan, ELLE, Harper’s BAZAAR and Car and Driver.
Other Hearst businesses include: digital services operations such as iCrossing and KUBRA; and investments in emerging digital and video companies such as BuzzFeed, Vice, Complex Networks and AwesomenessTV.
With 20 titles in the US, Hearst is the largest publisher of monthly magazines with a total paid circulation of nearly 30 million (AAM 1H 2017). Hearst Magazines’ print and digital assets reach nearly 123 million readers and site visitors each month – reportedly nearly two-thirds of all women and millennial women in the US. The company publishes close to 300 editions and 200 websites around the world, and operates iCrossing, a global, full-service digital marketing agency, and business process provider CDS Global.
Hearst Magazines holds a majority stake in KUBRA, a customer experience management solutions company, and is a partner with Condé Nast in the publishing services company PubWorX.
Rodale is a global health and wellness content company based in Emmaus, Pennsylvania, and New York. With 100 editions in 67 countries, Rodale publishes the largest, most established health and wellness lifestyle brands, including Men’s Health, Prevention, Women’s Health, Runner’s World, Bicycling and Rodale’s Organic Life.
