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Byline:
MR. SUBLIMINAL?: Could Conde Nast advertisers be feeling a pinch in their pocketbooks in ’96?
An unusual statement issued Thursday by Conde president Steven T. Florio said the company would freeze its ad rates for the rest of 1995, despite “unprecedented cost increases” in ink, postage and paper.
“For us to increase advertising rates midyear could interrupt and disrupt” advertisers’ plans, Florio said.
A Conde Nast spokesman said the statement is not intended as an omen of future hikes and added, “Anybody who takes an increase after this is going to look like a jerk.”
NEW HAT FOR HATFIELD: Julie Hatfield, who’s been covering fashion for the Boston Globe since 1980, is moving on to become an editor in the paper’s lifestyle section.
“They’re calling me the Martha Stewart of the Globe,” said Hatfield. “I’ll be writing about home entertaining, relationships and doing celebrity interviews.”
Hatfield also noted that she’s going on tour to Scotland and England with her daughter, rocker Juliana Hatfield, at the end of the month. Pam Reynolds, who had been editing the Globe’s “At Home” section, is taking Hatfield’s place.
ROWLEY-VISION: Cynthia Rowley is taking her fashion to the streets. The designer’s April 6 Bryant Park show will be simulcast onto Sony’s Jumbotron in Times Square and to the news station New York One.
“The whole thing about fashion is that everyone tries to be elite and mysterious,” she said. “The point of selling is to get people excited about the clothes.”
BUMPY NEWS: The French equivalent of Consumer Reports has just run a front page story on anti-cellulite creams, and all 10 brands tested lost. The monthly 50 Millions de Consommateurs, published by the French Institut National de la Consommation, rated Shiseido’s Contour Minceur pour le Corps “insufficient,” and others — including Biotherm’s Minceur Beaute Express, Dior Svelte and mass-market leaders like Lineance Gel-Creme — got a “very insufficient”.
Executives at Biotherm immediately penned a letter to beauty journalists contesting the findings. Meanwhile, the timing couldn’t be worse for Lancome and Clarins, both of which are launching new slimming creams this spring.
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MCCALL’S NAMES LIPENER: It seems as if McCall’s fashion editors become freelance fashion stylists and freelance fashion stylists become McCall’s fashion editors. Mali Lipener, formerly a freelance fashion stylist, has been named fashion editor of the magazine, succeeding Sally Cannon — who has become a freelance fashion stylist.