Gruner + Jahr is a publishing house headquartered in Hamburg, Germany. The company was founded in 1965 by , , and Gerd Bucerius. From 1969 to 1973, Bertelsmann acquired a majority share in the company and gradually increased it over time. After 2014, the company was a fully owned subsidiary of the Gütersloh-based media and services group. Under the leadership and innovation strategy of Julia Jäkel, Gruner + Jahr evolved into a publishing house producing cross-channel media products for the digital society.
With more than 500 magazines and digital products and services, Gruner + Jahr is one of Europe's largest premium magazine publishing companies. Its activities primarily focus on Germany and France. Among the most well-known media brands are Brigitte, Capital, Geo, and Stern, along with Chefkoch.de and Stern.de. In addition, Gruner + Jahr owns a share in Spiegel Verlag.
In August 2021, RTL Deutschland announced the acquisition of Gruner + Jahr for €230 million euros. The deal was completed on January 11, 2022, from which point the Gruner + Jahr became a brand of the RTL Deutschland group. The company was later renamed to RTL Publishing.
History
1965–1969
Gruner + Jahr was founded in 1965 by Richard Gruner, John Jahr, and Gerd Bucerius. Bucerius and Jahr published magazines, and Gruner ran a printing firm. The impetus for the three entrepreneurs to merge was the need to achieve positive economies of scale, for example with regard to purchasing paper for the printing firms or to the distribution of magazines via reading circles. The merger was promoted mainly by Gerd Bucerius, and the magazines that the shareholders brought into the company formed the basis for the joint business of Gruner + Jahr. The key magazines were, among others, Brigitte, Capital, Stern, and . By 1965, they had a joint circulation running into the millions. The company Gruner + Jahr was established as a limited liability partnership, in which Gruner held 39.5%, Jahr 32.3%, and Bucerius 28.2% of the shares. By 1968, sales had grown to over 400 million Deutsche Mark. This made Gruner + Jahr Germany's largest press company at the time, next to Axel Springer.
In 1969, Richard Gruner stepped down from the company. Differences concerning the political and strategic orientation of the publishing house prompted this move. Gruner gave up his shares to his co-shareholders, Bucerius and Jahr, who for a short time each owned 50%. Both subsequently sold 25% of Gruner + Jahr to Bertelsmann. In 1970, Bucerius and Jahr transitioned into the newly created supervisory board, and management responsibility was entrusted to a five-person executive board. In 1971, with a view to strengthening the management's independence, the company converted the general partner (shareholder with unlimited liability) of Gruner + Jahr into a stock corporation. Following his retirement from the operative business, in 1973 Bucerius swapped his shares in Gruner + Jahr for an equity stake in Bertelsmann. As a result, the group advanced to become the majority shareholder in Gruner + Jahr, and, by 1975, Bertelsmann had increased its share to a total of 74.9%. Upon the retirement of Bucerius, the rights to the weekly newspaper Die Zeit were transferred to a foundation in order to safeguard the publication's business independence over the long term.
1960s, 70s and 80s
In the 1960s and 1970s, the business of Gruner + Jahr was initially focused on expanding activities in the German market. An example of this was the acquisition of minority shareholdings in Spiegel Verlag and Vereinigte Motor-Verlage (today ) in the year 1971. At the end of the 1970s, the company then embarked on a period of expansion abroad: In France, the subsidiary Participations Edition Presse (today ) was established in 1978, and that same year, Gruner + Jahr acquired the Spanish publishing company and the US printing firm Brown Printing. In the 1980s, additional shareholdings and subsidiaries were acquired abroad, for example in Great Britain.