March Madness: Putting More Numbers to the Media's Pain

The number of advertising pages for monthly magazines in March suffered a 26% plunge, to 10,678, according to Media Industry Newsletter.

Even longtime observers can’t remember a time when ad pages have fallen as steeply.

“I doubt if the Great Depression was as bad,” said Steven Cohn, editor in chief of MIN, who has been covering the magazine industry for 22 years.

For the first quarter, the total number of pages came to 26,167, a 22% drop from the same period a year ago.