With ad sales at a premium, it’s more important than ever for publications to have a stellar sales team in place.

That’s why it comes as no surprise that The Week, the opinion and commentary magazine, has brought Timothy Koorbusch to lead its national sales team. Koorbusch, who formerly worked as New York sales director for the Sports Illustrated Golf Group at Time Inc., has joined The Week as national sales director, where he’ll lead the magazine’s print and digital advertising teams.

Prior to his work at the Sports Illustrated Golf Group, Koorbusch worked at Sunset magazine, Fortune, Fortune Small Business and National Review.

Full release after the jump

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It’s been a tough year for the publishing industry, and magazines in particular have had it rough. Every major publisher has had to shutter at least one of its titles, and some of our favorite glossies have gone to that great magazine rack in the sky.

While it would take forever to list all the over 400 magazines that have folded this year, we here at FishbowlNY put together a timeline of some of the bigger names that were shuttered this year. The bad news? It looks like in the last six months of the year the number of titles snowballed. Here’s hoping that 2010 looks a lot brighter.

After the jump, our timeline

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Last week we asked readers, “What print title will you miss the most” after the year full of closures?

The response was indisputable: Gourmet magazine, the award-winning epicurean title published by Condé Nast that was closed along with three other magazines in October, was far and away your number one choice, coming in with 28 percent of your votes.

Coming in second was Domino, also a Condé title, while Portfolio and the recently shuttere demise of Editor & Publisher jostled for points with nine and eight percent of your votes, respectively.

Regional papers like The Washington Blade, The Baltimore Examiner, and The Rocky Mountain News apparently only affected those living where the paper was distributed, since they got the least amount of votes, although ironically in that same pile is Fortune Small Business, which only two percent of FishbowlNY readers were sad to see go.

Previously: Breaking: Condé Shutters Four Magazines: Cookie, Gourmet, Two Bridal Titles, Could E&P Have Been Saved?, Conde Nast Shutters Domino

It may be a terrible year for the print industry, with diminishing ad sales forcing magazines to scale back on the number of issues and pages they can afford, but at least one magazine is claiming that they’re doing better than ever.

The Wall Street Journal‘s one-year-old magazine, WSJ. (can’t forget that unnecessary period!) will begin printing six issues a year instead of its traditional quarterly print run, starting in March of next year. In addition, the glossy’s circulation will almost double from its current 800,000 subscribers to 1.5 million.

“The magazine speaks directly to the world’s most discerning consumers about the people, places and products that matter most to them,” saied WSJ. editor-in-chief Tina Gaudoin, who is perhaps forgetting the lessons learned this year in the closing of haute business and lifestyle titles like Trump Magazine, Portfolio, and Fortune Small Business.

Then again, The Wall Street Journal has managed to make itself an exception to every industry rule this year and is still expanding, so perhaps some of that luck will rub off on WSJ.

Full press release after the jump.

Previously: Tina Gaudoin To Edit WSJ Lifestyle Magazine

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2009 has been a tough year for business magazines and small business magazines in particular.

One month after Time Inc. decided to fold its custom publication Fortune Small Business, BusinessWeek‘s new owner, Bloomberg LP, has announced plans to shutter its small business-focused spin-off, BusinessWeek SmallBiz. The final issue of the bimonthly mag will be the December 2009/January 2010 issue, the company said in an announcement today.

The magazine’s coverage will be integrated into BusinessWeek.com’s Small Business Channel and the magazine’s global print edition, chairman Norman Pearlstine said.

The company did not comment on whether the magazine’s closure had any related layoffs, but we suspect last month’s brutal cuts of about 130 people across the BusinessWeek staff may have already taken care of that. If you have any other information, send us an email or leave a a tip in the box at right.

Full announcement after the jump

Previously: More On This Week’s BusinessWeek Layoffs

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As People magazine celebrates Johnny Depp as the “Sexiest Man Of The Year” (again), everything is not well in the state of People‘s publisher Time Inc. The company is still looking to trim $100 million from its budget through layoffs and buyouts, which could include up to 90 editorial positions at Fortune, Sports Illustrated, Time magazine and Money.

According to Keith Kelly in today’s New York Post, layoffs at Time are only a hair away, as the publisher should find out today how many people from their titles have stepped forward to accept buyouts.

Kelly already has the name of one high-ranking staff member who is gracefully bowing out of the competition: Fortune managing editor Steve Koepp, who has worked at Time Inc. for 29 years, will be taking one of the buyout offers. Another top Time Inc. editor, Time.com managing editor Josh Tyrangiel, has also removed himself from the staff, by accepting the top editor position at BusinessWeek. Fortune is looking to layoff 40 staffers compared to 12 at Time magazine, Kelly reports. (We’re hearing the number at Fortune might actually be closer to 25.)

Time Runs Out For Buyout Volunteers; Layoffs Loom — New York Post

Previously: First on FBNY: Time Inc. Shutters Custom Pub Fortune Small Business, Time Inc. Layoffs: Sports Illustrated Hit First, More To Come

Although Time Inc. has said that it will not shutter any publications as part of the restructuring it is undergoing right now, FishbowlNY has learned exclusively that the magazine publisher has decided to close American Express-owned custom pub Fortune Small Business. A Time Inc. spokesperson confirmed that the magazine will no longer be produced by the company’s Content Solutions division.

The magazine, which was sent directly to a group of one million Amex cardholders, just closed its last issue last week. A tipster also told FBNY one person lost their job as part of the closure. (See update below.)

Earlier this year, Time Inc. suspended publication of Time spin-of Style & Design and shuttered Southern Accents.

We’re also starting to get some news trickling in of layoffs starting at Time Inc. A spy reports that 12 editorial staffers at Time and eight at People have been asked to volunteer to leave. (Check out the memo here) Know more? Drop us a line.

Update: The New York Times has found a document Time Inc. has filed with the New York State Department of Labor giving notice that it will cut 280 jobs between now and the end of January. This is fewer than the 400 to 500 that have previously been projected, but we’ll see how it develops from here.

Another Update: Although earlier in the day we heard that only one person had been laid off in connection with FSB‘s closing, another tipster informed us later that the number could be as high as eleven — a fact that the Times just reported, citing an unnamed Times Inc. exec. The new number includes five full-time employees and six hourly staffers, who produced content that was also published on CNNMoney.com, making up much of its small business content.

Earlier: Time Inc Layoffs: Sports Illustrated Hit First, More To Come

Fortune Small Business and The Scientist were awarded Magazine of the Year prizes by the American Society of Business Publication Editors at the organization’s annual conference last week.

FSB was recognized in the 80,000+ circulation category while The Scientist took home the prize for magazines with circulation that is less than 80,000.

ASBPE, which announced the finalists for its awards last month, also honored David Silverberg, editor of the homeland security publication HSToday, with their first ever Journalism That Matters Award. American Farriers Journal editor Frank Lessiter took home the 2009 Stephen Barr Award for feature writing due to his investigative series probing the practice in the equine industry known as “soring,” or injuring horses in order to “to promote hoof action that judges look for in gaited horse competitions.”

A full list of the winners after the jump.

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The American Society of Business Publications has announced the 20 finalists for its two Magazine of the Year awards, to be presented during the organization’s National Editorial Conference next month.

In addition to the Magazine of the Year awards, the ASBPE will also present its first Journalism Matters Award to HSToday editor David Silverberg. The award honors a B2B journalist whose particular coverage resulted in “tangible change within government or industry,” the organization explained.

The finalists for the Magazine of the Year awards include American Medical News, CFO, Computerworld, Fortune Small Business, Spectrum, Lawn & Landscape, Macworld, PC World, Professional Builder and R&I in the 80,000+ circulation category and Architect, Associations Now, Automotive News, Chain Leader, Control, Exhibitor, Health Leaders, Information Security, Oregon Business, and The Scientist in the under-80,000 circ category.

The ASBPE will also be honoring 36 publications with National Azbee Awards of Excellence and 139 regional Azbees at its conference July 15 through July 17 in Washington, D.C. — the theme of which is “Thriving in a Challenging Economy and Evolving Digital Age.” A full list of honorees can be found at the ASBPE’s Web site.

The New York Press Club yesterday announced the 62 winners of its 2009 Journalism Awards. BusinessWeek led the award count with seven wins, while The New York Times‘ David Barstow will accept the Gold Keyboard Award for excellence in investigative journalism at the June 15 ceremony.

Barstow was awarded the Gold Keyboard for his investigative series “Message Machine,” which focused on the Pentagon under former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and the construction of the case for the war against and the occupation of Iraq.

Barstow’s work beat out two other finalists for the Gold Keyboard prize: The New York Daily News‘ investigation of the planning and construction of the new Yankee Stadium and Mark Thompson‘s Time magazine cover story about the U.S. military’s use of anti-depressant drugs, “America’s Medicated Army.”

In addition to the Gold Keyboard, the NYPC also chooses recipients for two other unique awards: the Nellie Bly Cub Reporter, which honors reporters with three years of experience or less, and the Reverend Mychal Judge Heart of New York for reporting that is most complimentary of New York City. Fortune Small Business‘s Mina Kimes will receive the Nellie Bly for her article “The End of Oil,” while the Rev. Mychal Judge Heart award will be bestowed upon three recipients: Sara Fishko of WNYC, the Associated Press‘ Beth J. Harpaz and Susan Dominus of the Times.

Over 300 entries were submitted to more than 20 categories of NYPC awards by New York-area newspapers, magazines, Web sites and TV and radio stations, with the winners picked by journalists, former journalists and academics with expertise in each specific category.

BusinessWeek was awarded prizes in the business reporting, consumer reporting, continuing coverage, feature reporting, political coverage and spot news categories. Several news organizations, including the Times, the AP, WCBS Newsradio, Bloomberg News, Newsweek/Newsweek.com and The Wall Street Journal all received four awards each.

A full list of the winners is after the jump

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