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Magazines have sliced their target markets even more finely by appealing to ever-narrower age groups often ignored by mainstream television. For example, magazines such as Youth’s Companion, Boy’s Life (the Boy Scouts’ national publication since 1912), Highlights for Children, and Ranger Rick have successfully targeted preschool and elementary-school children. The ad-free and subscription-only Highlights for Children topped the children’s magazine category in 2011, with a circulation of more than 2 million.

Leading female teen magazines have also shown substantial growth; the top magazine for thirteen- to nineteen-year-olds is Seventeen, with a circulation of 2 million in 2010.

Maxim, launched in 1997, targeted young men in their twenties and was one of the fastest-growing magazines of the late 1990s. Its covers boast the magazine’s obsession with “sex, sports, beer, gadgets, clothes, fitness.” But by 2010, the “lad fad” had worn off; ad revenues declined, although Maxim still had about 2.5 million subscribers.

Magazines that have had the most success with targeting audiences by age have set their sights on readers over fifty, America’s fastest-growing age demographic. These publications have tried to meet the interests of older Americans, whom mainstream culture has historically ignored. By 2010, AARP The Magazine, the American Association of Retired Persons’ publication, founded in 1958, had a circulation of 23.7 million, far surpassing those of all other magazines. (Its sister publication, AARP Bulletin, has a similar circulation.) AARP The Magazine articles cover a range of topics related to lifestyle, travel, money, health, and entertainment, such as the effects of Viagra on relationships, secrets for spectacular vacations, and how playing poker can sharpen your mind (see Table 4.1).