BBC to sell Who Do You Think You Are magazine

The BBC is to sell off all rights to its non-branded magazines and license or contract away control of additional titles to private equity firm Exponent, in a deal worth £121 million.

One of the titles which BBC Worldwide is selling off outright is Who Do You Think You Are magazine, along with long standing titles such as Home and Antiques and the long running Radio Times. Between July and December 2010 Who Do You Think You Are magazine had a circulation of 22,373, an increase in readership of some 10.4% from the previous year, and was ironically the title with the highest increase in subscription rate of the eleven titles to be sold off.

If the deal gets Office of Fair Trading approval within the next 40 days, it is expected that Exponent will create a new company to which the majority of BBC Magazines staff and operations will transfer.

For more on the story visit www.marketingmagazine.co.uk/news/1084958/BBC-Worldwide-shed-magazines-121m-deal/

And for a comment on what I think of it all - see my previous post of March 2010 at http://scottishancestry.blogspot.com/2010/03/could-bbc-who-do-you-think-you-are.html, when the idea was first suggested.

Chris