Playboy Posts Q2 Loss

CHICAGO, August 6: Playboy
Enterprises has released its second quarter results, with revenues down 14
percent to $73.4 million, and a loss of $2.1 million, as compared with the
year-ago profit of $1.9 million.

Playboy’s chairman and
CEO, Christie Hefner, said: "Traditional media are facing a secular shift as a result
of changes in consumer behavior and the migration of advertisers to new
platforms. This has created a challenging environment for our print and TV
businesses, which has been compounded by the current macro-economic climate.
However, we believe that the changing media business model also creates a
number of opportunities for us, both because of our globally recognized brand
and our profitable existing digital businesses.”

She concluded: "2008
has been and will remain a difficult year. At the same time, the Playboy brand
has never been more popular, and we see significant growth opportunities across
our licensing, digital and other international businesses. We are committed to
rationalizing our cost structure and executing our strategic plan to ensure
that we leverage our assets against the right business model to return this
company to consistent profitability and increase shareholder value.”

For the entertainment group,
segment income fell to $1.8 million on reduced revenues of $41.2 million.
Playboy reported that U.S. TV revenues dropped to $14.8 million, while
international revenues were flat at $13.4 million. There was a $3.2 million
drop in online/mobile revenues to $11.6 million.

The publishing group
narrowed its loss to $1.9 million, on revenues of $20.6 million. The licensing
group, meanwhile, saw its revenues rise 4 percent to $11.6 million, with a
10-percent gain in operating income to $6 million.

—By Mansha Daswani