Monica Bagrecha
Media

Eric D’Souza of ‘Dainik Bhaskar’ joins ‘Reader’s Digest’

D’Souza joins ‘Reader’s Digest’ as branch head and head, impact, West India. D’Souza aims at reinforcing it as a magazine that readers ‘want to’, not ‘have to’ read

Erick D’Souza, who was heading the ‘Dainik Bhaskar’ corporate office in Mumbai as general manager, special projects has left the daily to join ‘Reader’s Digest’ as GM and head, impact, West India. He will report to Ashish Chadha, GM, marketing, ‘Reader’s Digest’, and Ashutosh Bishnoi, the magazine’s publishing director. According to Chadha, D’Souza will help provide good services to the magazine’s advertisers and also contribute to the ongoing expansion process of the magazine.

In his new role, D’Souza will be responsible for generating revenue, space marketing and overlooking various advertising aspects. Besides the regular space marketing initiatives, he will bring innovative ideas to pump up readership figures for the magazine.

D’Souza has been a media veteran with 26 years of experience. From 1991 till date, he was with ‘Dainik Bhaskar’.

He began his career with space marketing at Magna Publishing’s ‘Stardust’ in 1981 and went on to spend a decade there. During his time there, the group launched 9-10 magazines including ‘Savvy’, ‘Society’, ‘Health & Nutrition’, ‘Showtime’ and ‘Parade’.

Bringing his learning from the two media houses (Magna Publishing and ‘Dainik Bhaskar’), he sees himself playing a long innings at ‘Reader’s Digest’, too. D’Souza is confident that magazines will soon catch up once again and counter the competition seen by the fragmentation of media. According to him, that has been happening due to the high penetration rate of television and its weaning away of leisure time and hence, readership.

D’Souza says, “I have grown up reading ‘Reader’s Digest’, and it has always been an essential part of my personality.”

For the record, ‘Reader’s Digest’ touches upon 12 affinities including humour, fiction, medicine and travel. It recorded a hike of 74 per cent in sales and its circulation has gone up to 6 lakh per month from 4 lakh when the India Today Group acquired it in October 2003.

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