For This Publisher Print is Not Dead, It’s Thrilling

plus-2-2You’re in the newsstand browsing for a title, something that truly interests you and speaks to your heart and soul. Yet you hesitate even picking it up in case someone might see. Is it the guilty pleasure of Hollywood gossip rags that give you pause, or something much deeper?

Plus magazine editor-in-chief Diane Anderson-Minshall gets it. And that’s why the recent rebrand of their publication is such a very good thing for readers.

Anderson-Minshall recently spoke to Samir “Mr. Magazine” Husni about the decision to change the title of their magazine from HIV Plus to simply Plus. In the interview she notes it was about better serving their readers.

“Although we live in the 21st century and in an era of natural enlightenment overall; unfortunately, there is still a stigma attached to the three letters HIV virus and the implications and stereotypes that may follow,” Anderson-Minshall notes.

“That’s why the powers-that-be at HIV Plus magazine decided that their message of care and concern for people who suffer from HIV and all chronic, medically-managed illnesses would be better served to rebrand without those three letters. Hence, Plus magazine was born with the intent of opening up a whole new conversation with people who felt uncomfortable picking up the magazine when it was known as HIV Plus.”

“The bottom line is we’re recognizing that our readers have HIV, which is a chronic manageable condition and it’s not a definer of their lives, so we have to recognize that they need more out of a magazine than just treatment information. They’re looking for a whole magazine for the whole totality of their lives,” she continues.

The result is a magazine that embraces the trend toward lifestyle publications while still very cognizant of the needs and issues of its primary audience.

As to the decision to publish in print, ““Print is not dead for us; it’s thrilling. Of course, I hear it in other magazines and it scares me to death because I’m such an old print horse that I never want it to go away. And so it’s really exciting for me to be at a magazine where there’s never talk of not doing print anymore. Yes, it’s doing well.”

We wish them all the best with their rebrand. Good stuff.