PROFILE OF OUTSIDE MAGAZINE

The eye-catching, outdoor-living publication has gained a prominent place among the nation's magazines. Advertising Age chose Outside as one of 1991's five best, and Adweek listed it fifth among its 10 hottest magazines.

"When few one-magazine companies can compete in today's publishing game, publisher Lawrence Burke is running circles around his competition," reports the Dec. 15 issue of Publishing News.

Average paid circulation was 375,000 in March, with expectations running to 400,000 by October 1992. Last month's figure represented a jump of 30,000 since June of 1991. Circulation increased by 10.4 percent from July 1990-June 1991, the Audit Bureau of Circulations reports.

The magazine's 1.2 million readership - 73 percent male - has increased over the past five years by some 25,000 subscribers annually. The renewal rate is 64 percent.

For January-June 1992, ad page sales grew 17.2 percent from the year before. Ad revenues climbed 26.2 percent to $10.1 million, according to Publishers Information Bureau.

Despite Outside magazine's failure last Thursday to capture the prize in the "General Excellence" category at the National Magazine Awards (the industry's equivalent of the Oscars), in previous years it has won the National Magazine Awards recognition for "General Excellence" and "Essays & Criticism" in the 100,000-400,000 circulation group.