THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Tuesday, October 1, 1996 TAG: 9610010415
SECTION: BUSINESS PAGE: D1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY DAVE MAYFIELD, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: NORFOLK LENGTH: 40 lines
Landmark Communications Inc. said Monday that it purchased a Richmond-based sports and trading-card magazine publisher called Tuff Stuff Publications Inc.
Terms of the purchase, from Cadmus Communications Corp. of Richmond, were not disclosed.
Tuff Staff will be added to Landmark's Specialty Publications division. Through that unit, Norfolk-based Landmark already publishes eight nationally circulated magazines that focus largely on antiques and collectibles.
Landmark is a media conglomerate whose holdings include The Virginian-Pilot and The Weather Channel.
Tuff Stuff's flagship publication, Tuff Stuff, is the nation's leading monthly guide to sports cards and sports collectibles, with about 130,000 paid subscribers. Tuff Stuff also publishes two other monthlies - Collect!, which focuses on nonsports trading cards, and RPM, which is aimed at NASCAR racing memorabilia - plus a half-dozen other quarterly or annual sports-oriented magazines.
Through a previous venture with Landmark, Tuff Stuff has also been providing collectibles data via the global Internet computer network.
Richard F. Spears, president of Landmark Specialty Publications, said Landmark plans to keep all 56 full-time employees of Tuff Staff and continue all of its publications. He said the operation will remain based in Richmond.
Cadmus purchased a majority stake in Tuff Stuff in 1992 and bought the remaining interest in 1995. The company last disclosed Tuff Stuff's annual revenues in fiscal 1993: about $8 million at that time. Spears said the sales have grown rapidly since then, but neither he nor a Cadmus executive would disclose the most recent year's sales total. ILLUSTRATION: Color illustration
[Cover of magazine cover]
KEYWORDS: LANDMARK COMMUNICATIONS
by CNB