London — Ailing U.K. based men's magazine Loaded has been acquired by Paul Baxendale-Walker, proprietor of adult production studio Bluebird Films. Baxendale-Walker purchased the monthly from Vitality Publishing through his company MPRO.
Baxendale-Walker told TheGuardian.com that, along with featuring more "girl and glamour content" in the publication, he plans to launch two Loaded TV channels, one mainstream and the other adult oriented.
"There are very good synergies between Loaded, the brand and assets and the multimedia companies that I already own," Baxendale-Walker said. "It is a series of misfortunes that brought [Loaded] into administration, an accident. It is profitable, it is viable.
"Bluebird's assets and experience are at the sharp end of the market, if you will. Injecting it into Loaded will put it in the stratosphere but I will keep the essence of it — I have an affinity for the Loaded DNA."
Loaded was founded in 1994 by IPC Media and ushered in the "lad mag" style of publishing that would introduce popular periodicals such as Maxim and FHM. It was sold by IPC Media to Vitality Publishing in 2010.
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