Ebony's Johnson: 'long term, we'll win.' - John Johnson - Magazine People - column

Ebony's Johnson: "Long term, we'll win'

Last month when Black Enterprise magazine issued its annual list of the largest black-owned American corporations, Johnson Publishing Company topped it again. That's three years running for the publisher of Ebony and Jet, having unseated Motown Industries in 1983.

With his company's 1985 sales of $155 million, founder John Johnson has a virtual headlock on the black magazine market. The monthly Ebony, 40 years old last November, has a circulation of 1.8 million, and Jet, a news and entertainment weekly, reaches 820,000. Only Essence rivals them-- and Johnson owns a big piece of Essence Communications.

Talking in his eleventh floor suite at the Johnson Publishing building in Chicago, Johnson, an ebullient 68 year old who looks closer to 48, says there is room for more consumer magazines aimed at black Americans, and he wishes competitors well. But his latest project, EM: Ebony Man, aptly illustrates his formidable turf defenses.

Aimed at the fashion-conscious black male, he launched EM last November exactly one year after the debut of a similar publication, MBM: Modern Black Man, from MBM Publications. Though Johnson insists EM was not a direct retaliation to MBM, his own evaluation of why EM will succeed would make any competitor shiver.

"We have more resources, and I don't just mean money,' the publisher says. "We have more ways to get circulation because we have a big mailing list. We have more ways to advertise the product because we have Ebony and Jet. We have three radio stations, a syndicated television show. Even if [the magazines] were the same in terms of editorial quality, because of our resources, we will be able to out-advertise and out-promote them.'

Long-term, he concludes, "I think we'll win.' The logic is convincing.

Instinct to launch

EM is no sure thing, however. Ad budgets in general have remained tight this year. And it is still unclear whether such a magazine is needed, by either advertisers or readers. Johnson admits that many similar publications have failed in the past. But his instincts tell him that the times are finally right. Men are more concerned with fashion and grooming--witness the renaissance of Gentlemen's Quarterly, the fashion supplements in serious magazines such as Business Week, the growth of men's skin care lines.

"I've thought about it for many years,' says Johnson, a publisher who holds little stock in market research. "All my instincts, all my educated guessing, along with my heart, tell me that this is the time to do it.'

Early response from readers has reassured him: circulation is running about 50,000 more than the guarantee of 200,000, according to Johnson, though no direct mail subscription promotion has been conducted. MBM'sx circulation is approximately 180,000.

Johnson's instincts--not to mention his optimism--have served him well in the past. He launched Ebony into a segregated America in 1945, a decade before Martin Luther King Jr. emerged on the civil rights front. Ebony's mission from the start has been to inform and inspire. As Johnson wrote in a forward to the fortieth anniversary issue: "We believed in November 1945 that Black Americans needed positive images to fulfill their potentialities.' Four decades ago, the concept of Ebony was startling. It has changed little since, and the magazine has succeeded beyond his dreams.

No slacking off

Yet Johnson is still hustling--"running scared,' as he likes to say--though his age and accomplishments, including a personal fortune reported to be $150 million, would make a lesser man kick back and relax. He is looking for company growth, and right now the fastest growing part of Johnson Publishing is a prestige line of make-up for women of color, Fashion Fair cosmetics, whose sales are booming abroad.

Last year was exceptionally busy, both with the launch of EM and of a syndicated television show, "Ebony/Jet Showcase!' in September. The program, a half-hour weekly magazine studded with black celebrity interviews, is Johnson's second foray into the broadcast arena. He pulled a similar program from the air after a brief run in 1982. The new show is now syndicated in 72 markets reaching 70 percent of black households.

Johnson also added a third radio station to his holdings last year, but backed out of a consortium buying a Buffalo television station because he thought the financials too risky.

And, finally, he bought 20 percent of the stock of rival Essence Communications --an arrangement that, he acknowledges, certainly did not please Essence principals Clarence Smith and Ed Lewis. Johnson swears he bought the stock for investment purposes only, and he has no place on the board of directors.

Will he buy more? The publisher says he has no intentions of trying to, "but if someone calls me up and offers me some shares, I would buy them.' And he says the holdings would not sway him from starting a black women's magazine to compete with Essence.

Heiress apparent

That task, should Johnson Publishing ever attempt it, could fall to Johnson's 28-year-old daughter, Linda Johnson Rice. She is his heiress apparent. For several years he has been grooming her, including her in all meetings and decisions. Rice now runs "Ebony/ Jet Showcase!' on her own and has been involved in Ebony Fashion Fair, a traveling fashion show produced by Johnson's wife, Eunice. (As the publisher points out, Johnson Publishing is truly a family business: "We have our board meetings at home.')

Johnson is on no time-line for retirement. He will probably never completely "hand over' the business to Linda, he says, but does envision her being chief executive officer to his chairman. And he feels fully confident in her ability to run Johnson Publishing because she has the essential ingredient: instinct.

Photo: Chicago at his feet: On the city's welfare rolls as a child, publisher John Johnson is now sole owner of the country's largest black-owned business.

Photo: Heavy on celebrity profiles and stories of black achievers, Johnson's magazines aim to inspire their readers. EM: Ebony Man is the newest addition to the stable.

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