Latin Trade magazine shutters offices, staff laid off; closure rumored after 14 years

I’ve posted before as to the impact on magazines of digital media and shifts in advertising trends, here, and here … and here.

But, it is with great sadness that I have to share that I’ve just learned that Latin Trade, the Miami-based stalwart of the Latin American pan-regional media since it was launched 14 years ago, is closing its Miami editorial headquarters and may be on the verge of ceasing print publication, apparently falling victim to the advertising downturn that is hitting so many magazine groups.

LT Publisher Mike Zellner, formerly Editor-in-chief, says the magazine is moving forward, but some staffers and the magazine’s network of stringer correspondents in the region are talking closure. It would be a real tragedy to see total disappearance of Latin Trade, which has been reporting the ins and outs, ups and downs of Latin business and politics now for nearly a decade and a half.

In the early 90s, at the height of economic liberalization, free-trade talk and trend toward greater democracy sweeping the region following resolution of the Latin American debt crisis, Latin Trade was launched by the entrepreneurial team of publisher Richard Roffman and editor JP Faber. The two later sold LT to Freedom Communications, the Irvine, CA-based publisher of the Orange County Register. (Note: Roffman and Faber subsequently launched Miami Business and Latin CEO magazines, later merged into South Florida CEO magazine — which also closed here recently, the result of advertising woes — and are now embarked on a new venture, China Trade magazine, struggling to get its footing in the current magazine market.

In 1999, longtime Latin Trade editor Joachim Bamrud left the magazine to pursue other Internet-related opportunities (he now edits the online Latin Business Chronicle) and then-LT publisher Sabrina Crow scored an editorial coup with the deft move of hiring Zellner away from his decade-long stint and chief editor post at AmericaEconomia magazine to take over the news helm at Latin Trade.

Under the umbrella of Freedom’s Internet division, Freedom Interactive Media, Latin Trade launched a B2B regional online trade portal at www.LatinTrade.com, under the guidance of CEO Sue Tremblay (disclosure: LatinTrade.com was for a time in merger talks with a startup B2B trade portal for which I worked as director of content and information, 1hemisphere.com; both startups were way too far out in front of their projected e-commerce customer base in Latin America and both fell victim to the dot.com downturn in 2001).

In fairly rapid succession, Crow left the magazine to join Reed Business publications and succeeding her as publisher was Tim Scerba, who left in 2002 to join Edelman Public Realtions, where he is currently Latin America COO and CEO for Edelman Mexico. An employee buyout of the magazine from Freedom was miraculously engineered by Zellner, Tremblay and other staffers, keeping the magazine alive and on an even keel. Tremblay departed to join Nielsen Business Media as Zellner moved to the publisher’s post, bringing in longtime Latin American correspondent Greg Brown at the editorial helm, supported by Santiago Fittipaldi, formerly of Latin Finance and Thomson’s IFR-Latin America. Brown, who started a Latin Trade LinkedIn Group during his tenure, recently left to become Editorial Director of the Financial Publishing Group at Newsmax Media and was replaced as LT Editor-in-chief by Fittipaldi.

As Zellner notes in his LinkedIn profile, Latin Trade has long been considered “Latin America’s No. 1 pan-regional business magazine.” Uniquely published in Spanish, English and Portuguese, LT has won numerous editorial awards over the years, including 26 in the past six years alone. Short of a white-knight rescue that saves the print edition of the magazine or a successful transition to an all-digital publication, Latin Trade may go the route of so many magazines these days … into oblivion. For the region and for its readership these many years, let’s hope it stays alive in some format or other. ¡Que Viva Latin Trade!

Update: Latin Trade issues press release on ‘restructuring,’ see full text appended in comments below

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