Rogers just announced it has sold its publishing division, including magazines, digital publications and custom content business, to St. Joseph Communications, the owner of Toronto Life and other magazines. The deal is expected to close in April but no financial information was announced. St. Joseph says it will keep all current employees.
It’s been known for a while that Rogers has been trying to offload its magazines to focus on broadcasting and telecom. The big question was who was going to buy it. A sale was reportedly in the works last fall to Graeme Roustan, owner of The Hockey News, but that deal fell apart. There was also reportedly a proposal by employees of the division to buy it, but Rogers did not seem to like that idea.
The deal includes Maclean’s, Chatelaine (English and French), Today’s Parent and HELLO! Canada, plus the “digital publications” Flare and Canadian Business. It does not include MoneySense (the Roustan deal also excluded that website, and it was sold to another buyer) nor anything Sportsnet-branded.
