Fast Company (magazine)

Fast Company

October 2009 cover of Fast Company
Managing Editor Bob Safian
Categories Business magazine
Frequency 10 times per year
Publisher Fast Company, Inc
Total circulation
(2011)
738,950[1]
First issue November 1995
Company Mansueto Ventures
Country USA
Language English
Website http://www.fastcompany.com
ISSN 1085-9241

Fast Company is a full-color business magazine that releases 10 issues per year and reports on topics including innovation, digital media, technology, change management, leadership, design, and social responsibility. Fast Company's current editor is Bob Safian, a veteran of Fortune and SmartMoney.

Contents

Origins and history

Fast Company was launched in November 1995 by Alan Webber and Bill Taylor, two former Harvard Business Review editors. The publication began with $550,000 in funding from 11 individuals, raised to create a prototype.[2]

In 1997, Fast Company created an online social network, the "Company of Friends" which spawned a number of groups that began meeting in person.[3]

In 2000, Fast Company was sold to Gruner + Jahr, majority owned by media giant Bertelsmann, for $350 million. At the time this was the second largest amount for any US magazine in history.[4] G&J sold the magazine in 2005 and shortly thereafter exited the U.S. magazine market.

In 2011, Fast Company redesigned their website, and provided an online app that allows users to view all articles posted electronically and allows users to view magazine articles with a subscription code. The site has a global rank of 1,769 (US: 728). The articles on the site are divided into four main groups (Technology, Design, Leadership, and Ethonomics). The site is updated frequently with new articles and content. The site also displays infographics.

Current activity

The magazine and its website are now owned by Mansueto Ventures, a private media company controlled by Joe Mansueto, the founder and CEO of mutual fund rating company Morningstar, Inc.. Mansueto became a billionaire and joined the Forbes 400 list of the richest Americans when Morningstar went public in 2005. Mansueto Ventures also owns Fast Company's sister publication, Inc. magazine, which is dedicated to covering growing businesses and entrepreneurs.

FastCompany.com operates as a network of sites with Inc.com and is a member of the Online Publishers Association. The website features FC Now, which launched in 2002, and was one of the first staff-written blogs maintained by a print magazine.

Regular features include "Made to Stick" by Chip Heath and Dan Heath, "Do Something" by Nancy Lublin, and short profiles in a section of the magazine called "Next."

References

External links