Employees of Health magazine were stunned to learn this week that, after a hugely successful year, they are to be displaced.
    Parent company Time Inc. is moving Health's editorial offices from San Francisco, where they've been for nearly 10 years, to, of all places, Birmingham, Ala. Though not exactly a publishing Mecca, that's where the company's Southern Progress division has its headquarters, home to titles including Cooking Light and Southern Living.
     For Health's editorial staff, it was tantamount to an ultimatum: Pack up your lives and move across the country, or find a new magazine to work for.
    Editor in chief Barbara Paulsen has said she'll quit rather than make the move, and most of her editors, some of whom have been with the magazine since it started 15 years ago, are expected to do likewise. 
     They say they feel bewildered and betrayed by a decision that seems to have little basis in business logic.
     One senior editorial staffer says representatives from Time Inc. flew out to San Francisco to explain the company’s position to the staff yesterday, but their rationale didn’t hold up under scrutiny.
     "We asked very tough questions, and they were not able to answer satisfactorily at all," she says.
     Though most will choose to stay in San Francisco because that’s where their families are or because they prefer the city, the staffer says it also makes more sense to maintain in the Bay Area, where editors have access not only to top-quality writing talent but also to nearby world-class research institutes at Stanford, UCSF and UC Berkeley.
     "The whole way we practice magazine journalism is tied to being in San Francisco."
     What’s more, she says, little attempt was made to persuade people to make the move to Birmingham. Rather, she says, Time Inc. executives seem to think they can recreate Health in Alabama with an almost totally new editorial staff—a judgment she considers a miscalculation.
      "We’re wondering whether it’s parochialism or stupidity or whether they’re just not being honest with us."
     But Southern Progress president Tom Angelillo denies that the company is just as happy to start from scratch with a new editorial staff.
    "Continuity is very important to us," he says, adding that he hopes more staffers will change their minds about moving once they’ve had some time to consider the idea.
     To help sway the undecided, Angelillo says the company will pay for them to visit Birmingham, and it will pay moving costs for anyone who chooses to make the trip. 
    A bigger incentive may be the lower cost of living in Birmingham; salaries will not be adjusted downward to reflect the difference.
    The rationale for transplanting editorial operations is relatively straightforward, says Angelillo.
    "Quite candidly, having a standalone magazine in San Francisco with a major presence in Birmingham and New York created quite a few challenges. I know of no other major magazine that’s published out of three cities."
    With operations established in Birmingham, he predicts that Health will be able to grow its rate base from 1.3 million to 2 million in five years or less.
    Crichton and Southern Progress editorial honcho Jeanetta Keller will both be flying to San Francisco next week to meet one-on-one with editorial personnel to help explain the decision and articulate their vision for the title, says Angelillo.
     But they’ll have to work awfully hard if they’re going to soothe the bruised feelings of employees who feel that their hard work has been repaid with ingratitude.
    One longtime staffer says it’s the timing of the move he finds particularly vexing. With the dot.com boom just ended, San Francisco’s job market for journalists is in a lull for the first time in years.
     "If this were nine months ago it would be a different story," he says. "Even six months from now, it would probably be a little bit easier."
     Likewise, he says, if Health were relocating to New York instead of Birmingham, at least half the staff would move with it, and those who chose to remain behind could see the sense in such a move.
     As it is, he says, "Folks here are just feeling dumbfounded and disrespected."

-Jeff Bercovici is a staff writer for Media Life.

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