Conde Nast is launching their premium men’s title GQ in India towards the end of September. Speaking exclusively to Campaign India, Oona Dhabar, Marketing Director, Conde Nast India confirmed that the issue would be hitting the stands at the end of this month. The magazine will be edited by Che Kurrien (pictured), while Almona Bhatia is the publisher of the title. The rest of the editorial team consists of Maniza Bharucha as managing editor; Iain Ball as features editor; Arjun Bhasin as fashion director and Rhea Saran as copy editor.
Brendan Allthorpe is GQ’s art director while Sachin Shetty is the art editor. Kurrien was earlier with Reuters, and has also worked at Time Out and The Indian Express.
Dhabar says, “GQ is being positioned as the magazine for the man in the Vogue household. GQ India’s cover price will be the same as that of Vogue, at Rs 100. GQ India will be an opinionated luxury lifestyle magazine for men. We plan to launch a high decibel marketing plan for the launch. We are evaluating our media mix, at the moment.” Dhabar says GQ’s launch issue is expected to have a print run of 35,000 and post the launch, they will evaluate if they need to bring that down to 30,000.