Those getting ready to frolic on the East End over Memorial Day will have plenty of thick, glossy magazines catering to their needs in the Hamptons.
Our East End spies say that Modern Luxury’s Beach and Dan’s Papers were the first to market on Thursday.
By Friday, a half dozen pubs are expected to flood the market and fight for attention on the rack. In sharp contrast to their city cousins, East End publications for the most part are booming and fat with ads.
And because everyone knows everyone out East, there is no shortage of internecine rivalries among the publishers.
“We’re the king of media out here,” insisted Richard Burns, chairman of Manhattan Media, which owns Dan’s Papers and three years ago added Avenue on the Beach, which features Southampton resident Nicky Hilton on this June’s cover.
He is adding one more issue, a year-end photo edition to be called On the Beach Illustrated — to total five issues this year.
Meanwhile, Cristina Cuomo, a onetime Avenue writer who said she first urged the publication to expand into the Hamptons, is now in her fourth year editing Beach, from Modern Luxury, which will publish six times over the summer.
“I try to create things that are unexpected in a sophisticated way,” said Cuomo, who earlier in her career edited Hamptons Magazine, the granddaddy of Hamptons titles. In the latest issue of Beach, Cuomo is running excerpts from Jimmy Fallon’s new children’s book and Candace Bushnell’s newest novel, “Killing Monica.” She also has Margaret Hoover, political commentator and great granddaughter of Herbert Hoover, writing about how she met and fell in love with her future husband, Daily Beast Editor-in-Chief John Avlon.
Cuomo said Beach is up 30 percent in ad pages from a year ago, with 84 in a 172-page edition. The cover features Alexandra Daddario — star of the soon-to-be released Warner Brothers film “San Andreas” — who also happens to be an East Ender.
And always one to give literary twists to her topic, she had Carla Gugino — who co-stars in the flick, playing Daddario’s mother — interview her about what it’s like growing up in the Hamptons.
Brandusa Niro, editor-in-chief of Daily Front Row, had teamed up with Dan’s Papers to produce a summer edition called Dan’s Hamptons.
She jumped ship and launched her own venture three years ago, which is now called The Daily Summer, even though it’s not daily but rather publishes five times this season — one more than a year ago. This Memorial Day, she is reporting a 50-ad-page issue of The Daily, up from 34 ad pages a year ago. For the summer, she’s predicting it will be up 70 percent in revenue and ad pages from a year ago.
She boasts a photo by legendary fashion photographer Gilles Bensimon of model Toni Garrn on the cover from a shoot done in St. Barts and lots of fashion coverage.
“Our strategy was to become the leading fashion title in the Hamptons, and it has resonated with the fashion, beauty and luxury advertisers,” said Niro. Advertisers from Dolce & Gabbana, Jimmy Choo, Max Mara, Bulgari, Eres, De Grisogono and Donna Karan have all jumped aboard this year.
Most of the magazines are distributed free to East Enders and rely on ad revenue to pay the freight.
Justin Mitchell, founder and publisher of 12-year-old Social Life, is actually doing something different as he tries to build a subscription base for people outside of the Hamptons. “We put a digital edition online for the first time and we’re pushing to pick up 10,000 to 20,000 subscriptions,” he said. His debut issue, which features Vanessa Hudgens on the cover, has 100 ad pages — up 18 percent from a year ago, he said.
Debra Halpert, the publisher of Niche Media’s Hamptons Magazine, is wrapping up her 10th year at the title while the magazine itself celebrates its 37th.
Editor-in-Chief Samantha Yanks recently launched Shop Hamptons, a curated site of things to do in the Hamptons, Halpert said.
“Our whole Web site was redesigned,” Halpert said. Hamptons magazine is actually a little thinner this year than a year ago, when it racked up 396 total pages. It has 320 this year. She blamed the brutal winter and an earlier-than-usual Memorial Day for the slow start but says she is more than making up for it in subsequent issues. “We’re tracking ahead of last year,” she said.
Kelli Delaney, a former top editor at Glamour and celebrity weeklies, migrated to the East End to launch KDHamptons online. She thinks the daily updating is the best way to go.
“People want to know what to do every day here,” she said. “It is such an exclusive, insular community that if you aren’t in the know, it’s not easy to navigate the Hamptons.
“Visitors read about it, and see glam TV shows, but then they are off the Jitney and realize they have no idea where to go,” Delaney added.