NME given glossy makeover and moved off bottom shelf

IPC Media’s NME, the newspaper-format rock magazine, will no longer be seen on the bottom shelves of newsstands with the likes of Loot, the free ads paper.

For the first time in its 50-year history, NME will be available alongside rival titles like EMAP’s Q and Mojo, following an inch and a half crop off its height.

The cover of the music weekly will also go glossy for the first time, with the first new-look NME, including a new logo, available on April 17. The cover price of the magazine has been increased by 20p to &£1.50.

According to the July to December 2001 Audit Bureau of Circulations, NME increased its weekly circulation to 76,841 up by 0.4 per cent period on period, and 0.6 per cent year on year.

NME publishing director Neil Robinson says: “The magazine market is as congested and competitive as ever and over the past ten years the floor position of NME in newsagents has been marginalised.”

To promote the magazine’s 50th anniversary the paper will host an exhibition of 50 classic rock photographs at The Eyestorm Gallery, London.

Two years ago, IPC Media merged Melody Maker with NME, making NME, which launched in 1952, the UK’s oldest music magazine.