Success Story | Magazine
Guidebook with a huge print run
A circulation of several million copies is more than respectable for a magazine devoted to health that is published twice a month—and so are the challenges that the Mohn Media teams in prepress, the pressroom, and the bindery must overcome every 14 days when producing Apotheken Umschau. After all, within five days they have to print and bind this large number of copies in well over a hundred different processing versions and organize delivery to more than 80% of pharmacies throughout Germany. Published by Wort & Bild since 1956, Europe’s highest-circulation magazine is available there as a free customer publication and enjoys great popularity. Apotheken Umschau is therefore the flagship of the major package of orders that Wort & Bild Verlag has placed with Mohn Media. This also includes the poster magazine Medizini, the family magazine Apotheken Umschau ELTERN, the customer magazine fit & vital plus, and HausArzt-PatientenMagazin. The partnership between Mohn Media and the Baierbrunn-based health publisher began in 2020. At that time, production of the magazines, which had previously been handled by Prinovis in Nuremberg, was divided between the Prinovis printing plant in Ahrensburg and Mohn Media. After operations in Ahrensburg were discontinued, Mohn Media took over production in full.
“Producing highly complex products such as our flagship publication, ‘Apotheken Umschau’—in more than 100 versions in some cases, with inserts and special finishes—while maintaining a strong commitment to quality and on-time delivery, and with a total annual print run well into the tens of millions, would be virtually inconceivable without a long-standing, close relationship built on trust. We value the impressive consistency, personal customer focus, and reliability of Mohn Media’s magazine team. We are delighted to have Mohn Media at our side as a partner that thinks ahead and contributes ideas of its own. An unbeatable factor in our shared success!”
Sandra Kho, Head of Production Management & Media Technology at Wort & Bild-Verlag.
Magazines for children and parents
Published monthly since 1974, the poster magazine Medizini is aimed primarily at children aged 5 to 12. With a circulation of around one million copies, the magazine is chiefly used to teach the younger generation about health and nature in a fun way and to attract them as pharmacy customers. Producing the magazine is quite demanding: the production time is relatively short at four days, and each issue includes a folded DIN A1 poster in the center. The family magazine Apotheken Umschau ELTERN, which is also published twelve times a year, combines features, expert content, and creative formats covering health and medicine, family, pregnancy and childbirth, and nutrition. The cover stories of the magazine, which has a circulation of several hundred thousand copies per issue, address topics that are particularly relevant and interesting to young parents.
Special publications for specific target audiences
The quarterly health magazine fit & vital plus is published by Wort & Bild in collaboration with medical supply stores and rehabilitation centers. The magazine has a six-figure circulation and is available free of charge at participating facilities. One particular production challenge is the wide range of versions, as each rehabilitation center and medical supply store receives customized copies featuring its own contact details and offers. Also published four times a year with a six-figure circulation, HausArzt-PatientenMagazin is designed specifically for display in waiting rooms. It features easy-to-understand, medically sound articles on preventive care, common diseases, and health policy.
Large quantity, special equipment
With a total annual magazine circulation well into the tens of millions, Wort & Bild Verlag is the largest client in the magazine market segment. And given the large number of different finishing options, as well as the recurring special productions throughout the year featuring spot colors, scented varnish, or special inserts such as organ donor cards, it is also one of the most demanding. This is a client that can only be satisfied when every aspect of production and collaboration works together seamlessly.