Hamburg, March 27, 2003
Gruner + Jahr, Europe‘s biggest magazine publisher, delivered a comparatively good performance in 2002 despite the advertising crisis, and will continue to grow in 2003, mainly by means of new title launches. EBITA, reported under to IAS (International Accounting Standards) for the first time, doubled year on year to 234 million (2001 pro forma: €117 million). Total earnings (EBITA including special gains) rose to €406 million. During the same period, revenues declined to €2.8 billion, due to disposals and the continuing decline in the ad business, especially in Germany. Net earnings amounted to €116 million (00/01: €40 million, reported under HGB German Commercial Code which restricts comparability), while cash flow more than tripled to €385 million (00/01 pro forma: €114 million/HGB). The Return on Sales was 8.3 percent.

"While the industry is still going through a slack period, G+J has already picked up speed again. We responded in time and successfully to the crisis in the advertising markets. In 2002, we profited like no other European publisher from our internationality. With more than 120 titles in 14 countries, our setup is broad enough to compensate even for major slumps in individual markets," said CEO Dr. Bernd Kundrun on Thursday in Hamburg. "We will dare to try new things, while also persisting with our consolidation course wherever adverse conditions demand it. In this way, we intend to stabilize and if possible improve our results even in these difficult times, and further increase our return on sales."

In combination with a cost and efficiency program launched in 2001, the publisher‘s international businesses made an above-average contribution to the positive results of 2002. NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC in Germany and the Netherlands were in the black in 2002, just three respectively two years after their launches. After the successful launch of WOMAN, STERN BIOGRAFIE and STERN CHRONIK in Germany and GEOLINO‘s French sister title GEO ADO in 2002, the first three months of the current year have already seen the introduction of three new titles: INC and FITNESS in China, as well as GLAMOUR, which hits newsstands in Poland today. Russia faces the imminent launch of the new youth title GEOLENOK. In the core markets USA and France, preparations are underway for new womens magazines scheduled for launch within the next 18 months. In 2002, Gruner + Jahr generated 63 percent of its revenues outside Germany. Advertising income accounted for 40 percent of the €2.8 billion in total revenues, distribution for another 31 percent. The printers contributed 20 percent to group revenues, and 9 percent were attributable to other income. Due to the disposal of the Berlin newspaper operations with their 920 employees and other adjustments (discontinuation of the magazines BIZZ, ONLINE TODAY, HOMESTYLE, ROSIE and of COMPUTERCHANNEL and other multimedia activities), the number of employees dropped to 11,367 (00/01: 12,946) worldwide.

Gruner + Jahr will continue to resolutely seize its opportunities despite a continuing consolidation in segments and markets that are still impacted by the crisis in the advertising industry. In the next few years, Gruner + Jahr will concentrate on growth through new titles and the extension of its market leadership in its core segments. Above all, G+J intends to step up its exploitation of the potential inherent in its powerful international media brands such as STERN, GEO, GALA, CAPITAL or FITNESS, through line extensions and internationalization. Other items in G+Js innovation and growth strategy include the development of innovative magazine concepts, and acquisitions.

Bernd Kundrun: "Our internal cost-cutting measures have paid off. Together with our employees, we were able to save over €70 million worldwide in 2002 just through our ‘Cost and Processes CAP‘ program. This will take some of the strain off the results year by year. But perhaps the most important step in 2002 was our decision to move forward despite the fierce headwind. The successful launch of our new magazines in Germany, France and China went down very well with readers and our advertising customers. We practice what we recommend to our business partners: Anti-cyclical behavior pays off. We have laid the foundation for innovations and growth, especially in the past year."

Kundrun takes a critical view of future developments in the German advertising market: "The first three months of the year have failed to meet the expectations of any publishing company. Nonetheless, we have gotten the impression that an improvement in Germany, too, could be forthcoming late in 2003. Now we‘ll have to wait and see what the repercussions are from the war in Iraq."

German Magazines Division
The German magazines division headed by Rolf Wickmann successfully bucked the crisis in the German ad market, which is now entering its third year and is deteriorating further at the moment. Results were stable at previous-year levels despite a decline in sales, so employees will receive profit participation for 2002. The division defied the industry trend by successfully launching the bi-weekly women‘s magazine WOMAN on Oct 22, 2002. It sold over 300,000 copies per issue and 265 ad pages in the first three months. STERN, Germany‘s most widely read weekly news magazine, further extended its brand family with STERN BIOGRAFIE and STERN CHRONIK. Sold copies of STERN are well over the previous years figures. With over 45 million Page Impressions per month, the STERN.DE homepage clearly exceeded its target for the year and advanced into the Top Ten websites in Germany.

Just two years after its launch, LIVING AT HOME is in the black and has increased its gross ad sales by 19 percent year-on-year. As in 2001, the people magazine GALA registered gains in the ad market. BRIGITTE WOMAN, the quarterly magazine in the BRIGITTE family catering to women above 40 since 2001, continued its steady increase in circulation and crossed the 200,000-copy mark. After the great success of its first special, "Ancient Egypt," which NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC GERMANY issued in October 2001 and which exceeded expectations with roughly 120,000 copies sold, the publisher will forcefully push ahead with line extensions of NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC GERMANY. GEO, which shows stable circulation, is successfully continuing the extension of its brand family. GEOLINO now sells over 200,000 copies a month.

In 2002, CAPITAL, Germany‘s biggest business magazine, looked back on 40 years of successful business journalism. Over 1,000 guests attended the anniversary celebration, including German chancellor Gerhard Schröder, in 2002. ESSEN & TRINKENs 30th anniversary issue in October became the best-selling issue in its history, with over 60 ad pages and 286,000 copies sold. In 2003, G+J will continue to develop its magazine brands in Germany and strengthen and extend its market leadership in core segments. To this end, Gruner + Jahr will continue investing in editorial quality and marketing. It will further strengthen its customer and sales focus, e.g. through key- account services and direct-to-customer marketing.

International Magazines Division
Thanks to rigorous cost management, the International Magazines division headed by Axel Ganz has significantly improved its results and profitability. The division is in an excellent position for a new growth phase. As Frances second biggest and most profitable publisher, Prisma Presse was able to top its excellent previous-year performance in 2002. Prisma Presse managed to keep its ad sales stable and outperformed the French market, which declined slightly overall. The youth magazine GEO ADO was successfully launched with the help of its young readership. The latter were invited to make editorial contributions to the first issue. With over 70,000 copies sold, GEO ADO attained instant market leadership among Frances quality titles for "collégiens" (1015- year-olds).

TÉLÉ LOISIRS bucked the market trend, further increasing its circulation and reporting average sold circulation of over 2 million for the first time. As of March 2003, TÉLÉ LOISIRS is available in Belgium as well. The French people magazines VOICI and GALA delivered a particularly positive performance, both making significant gains in the advertising market and maintaining or improving their circulation in the face of a declining distribution market. Prisma Presse had anniversaries to celebrate as well: 25 years of VSD and 15 years of VOICI two titles that have attained cult status in France, that have become firmly established on the market while managing to stay perpetually young. In 2002, G+J USA reaped the harvest it had sown in relaunching nearly all U.S. titles in 2001, and reinforced its strong position in the worlds biggest magazine market. After Prisma Presse, G+J USA is the second biggest mainstay of sales in the international magazines division, by a wide margin. G+J USA kept its revenues stable despite the discontinuation of HOMESTYLE and an enduringly difficult market environment.

G+J USA was able to significantly increase its advertising income and thereby extend its market shares in the relevant segments (PARENTS and CHILD in the "Parenthood" segment, FAMILY CIRCLE in "Womens Service," FITNESS in "Womens Fitness," YM in the "Teen" segment, INC and FAST COMPANY in the "Business" segment). G+J USAs ad pages increased by 6 percent, gross advertising income grew by 13.3 percent. Thus G+J USA grew more than twice as rapidly as the overall U.S. market and outperformed the Top 3 U.S. magazine publishers by far in terms of growth. The absolute highlights of the year were FITNESS with a 66 percent year-on-year increase in advertising and YM with a roughly 50 percent increase (all figures PIB, from Jan-Dec 2002). G+J USA not only improved its earnings and profitability, but also the quality of its magazines, as evidenced by a number of awards won by G+J USA titles in 2002. The Southern European markets of Spain and Italy maintained their past high level of earnings despite much weaker advertising markets. Here, too, this was based on cost-cutting measures and the excellent editorial standard of G+J‘s magazines. The fact that G+J Spain stands for quality magazines was borne out once more at the most recent awards ceremony hosted by Spain‘s magazine association ARI, at which MARIE CLAIRE and COSMOPOLITAN garnered three prizes. Gruner + Jahr/Mondadori in Italy continued operating at a high profit and reported the second-best results since Gruner + Jahr launched its operations in Italy, despite the advertising slump. The popular science magazine FOCUS is Italy‘s most frequently sold monthly magazine. Its more than 5 million readers make it the highestcirculation medium for Italy‘s "deciders." This year, it celebrated its 10th anniversary.

In Poland business was dynamically extended through editorial advances, combined with innovative marketing. Revenues and earnings both were improved significantly. In 2002, G+J Poland took the lead in the distribution and advertising market in women‘s magazines. To further extend its position, G+J has acquired the GLAMOUR license for Poland. The magazine‘s launch will take place on March 27, at the same time as the G+J Annual Press Briefing 2003. Nearly all G+J Poland titles command market-leading positions in their respective segments (No.1 or 2). Gruner + Jahr‘s three "younger" markets Holland, Russia and China are the source of important growth impulses. In Russia, after the successful establishment GALA and the excellent development of GEO, G+J will be launching the children‘s magazine GEOLENOK in May 2003. In China, Gruner + Jahr, in collaboration with the Peking-based publisher CLIP, now has four titles: CAR & MOTOR and FUMU/PARENTS (since 2002) and FITNESS and the business magazine INC. (as of spring 2003). Newspaper division

For the Newspaper division headed by Achim Twardy, 2002 was a year dominated by the continuing difficult situation in the German newspaper market. For the second year running, there was a major slump in the advertising market to be dealt with. The classifieds markets were especially hard hit, with the employment market in particular reflecting the negative economic development in Germany. However, the decline in circulation of regional subscription newspapers also continued in the reader market. Seen against this overall backdrop, the extremely positive development of the FINANCIAL TIMES DEUTSCHLAND (FTD) is an all the more remarkable achievement.

As in 2001, the FINANCIAL TIMES DEUTSCHLAND was able to steadily improve its circulation against the trend, and was 14% above previous year in Q4/ 2002, with 89,332 sold copies. Developments were especially pleasing in subscriptions, which at 53,364 are nearly 25% above previous year. In September 2002, the FTD got a lot of attention for the first-ever vote recommendation for the Bundestag (German Federal Parliament) elections ever issued by a daily German paper for its readers. This introduced, in Germany, a traditional practice of its sister paper "FT," a practice which in the Anglo-Saxon countries has become a fixture in election coverage. The increasing market acceptance of the FTD in the market was backed up by a market analysis carried out by Medien Tenor, a media research institute in Bonn. With 362 quotes, the "Financial Times" group of newspapers topped the list of most-quoted business periodicals in Germany, and became the first business medium in the Top Ten of all German media.

At the Dresden location, the August 2002 East- und Central European and East Germany flood disaster did not pass the SÄCHSISCHE ZEITUNG by. The newspaper had to evacuate its offices, and its archives were destroyed. Thanks to the untiring efforts of its employees, emergency issues were produced under the most unfavorable conditions imaginable. The wave of solidarity and aid that followed in the wake of the floods enabled the "Lichtblick" initiative, sponsored by SÄCHSISCHE ZEITUNG, to donate €8 million in aid for flood victims. The Eastern European newspapers BLIC in Serbia, EVENIMENTUL ZILEI in Rumania and NOVÝ ÈAS in Slovakia profited from their respective countries‘ economic growth and achieved good results. In all three countries, further investments were made in the journalistic quality of the papers, and their market position was strengthened. In Rumania, the holdings in the publisher EXPRESS were increased by nearly 26 % to 77%. The Sunday paper EVENIMENTUL ZILEI DE DUMINICA was also launched in Rumania. In Serbia, Gruner + Jahr acquired the majority (74.9 %) in BLIC Publishing, and has decided to build a new printing plant, with a 25.1% participation by BLIC.

As the result of a strategy process, Gruner + Jahr sold its Berlin-based newspaper operations to the von Holtzbrink publishing group effective July 1, 2002. Until the takeover by Holtzbrinck is legally cleared, G+J will continue to function as its shareholder, independently and for the interim. It is incumbent on the Holtzbrinck publishing group to bring about a situation that is permissible from an antitrust standpoint.

Printing division
G+Js printing plants, under the operative management of Volker Petersen, are the No.2 rotogravure printer in Germany and the No.4 magazine printer in the U.S. The printing division, too, felt the negative impact of the global advertising slump on its bottom line, but was able to compensate for this at least in part. Print volume in Europe dwindled due to the decline in magazine ad sales. Previous-year levels were achieved again in the second half of 2002 by compensating for this with external print jobs. Happily, printing operations in the US were able to improve their capacity load. New print orders more than compensated for any declines. However, the pricing pressure in the industry continued in 2002 and had a negative impact on earnings. G+Js Printing division registered continued growth, with the installation and startup of a new printing machine in Dresden, the continuing modernization of processing in Itzehoe and the startup of a sixth printing machine at Brown Printing Company in Woodstock. In 2003, the division plans to step up new customer recruitment for its printing businesses, not only in its core markets Germany and England, but also in France and the Benelux countries. In the U.S., the expansion phase of 2002 will be followed by a focus on optimizing operative business and preparing for taking on the big "Time Magazine" printing contract (partial print run of Time, Sports Illustrated, People).

For further information:

Kurt Otto
Press Spokesman
Gruner + Jahr AG & Co KG
Am Baumwall 11
20459 Hamburg
Telefon: +49-40-3703-3810
Telefax: +49-40-3703-5617
E-Mail: otto.kurt@guj.de