Photos from Louisville Magazine’s Facebook page…
LOUISVILLE, KY — Two of the city’s oldest and best-known media outlets, Louisville Magazine and Louisville.com, will have a new owner as of Aug. 31, 2018.
Local civic leader Matthew Barzun, the former United States Ambassador to the United Kingdom and a dot com pioneer at CNET, has agreed to purchase the publication and website from Dan Crutcher, who has owned Louisville Magazine since 1993 and was one of the founders of Louisville.com in 1997.
A Louisvillian since 2001, Barzun was a key fundraiser for Barack Obama’s presidential campaigns, serving as national finance chair for the 2012 re-election. As an ambassador, he built a reputation as a resourceful promoter of American values and a receptive listener to citizens far from capital cities. Since then he has served on the board of Gannett, Inc. and Tortoise Media.
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“It’s an honor to take the baton from Dan, who has run the magazine so well for 25 years, transforming it into a community institution and guiding it into the digital age with Louisville.com,” Barzun says. “We have a terrific team consisting of editorially independent journalists, as well as sales and production professionals who are united in their love of our city, as evidenced by their monthly coverage of diverse businesses, events and people, plus their caring investigative work like last month’s searing report on evictions. For me, this new chapter combines lifelong interests in publishing and journalism that have grown while at CNET and serving on the boards of Gannett and Tortoise Media, but wonderfully brings it all home — to Louisville.”
Louisville Magazine was founded in 1950 by the Louisville Area Chamber of Commerce, which owned the monthly magazine until it was sold to Crutcher in 1993. Louisville.com, one of the oldest information websites in the city, was established in 1997 by Crutcher and partner Watson Courtenay.
“I’m honored to have had the opportunity to lead Louisville Magazine for 25 years and Louisville.com for more than 20 years,” Crutcher says. “It has truly been a labor of love, both for producing good journalism and writing and in creating what I hope has been an informative, entertaining and useful magazine and website for Louisville. I am so pleased that I am able to hand them over to someone as community-minded and appreciative of the magazine’s traditions as Matthew Barzun. Under Matthew’s leadership, I believe their best days are ahead of them.”
In addition to the monthly issues of Louisville Magazine, the company also publishes Louisville Bride, Fit Louisville, College Guide, EATS and Swig and operates the Louisville Tickets online ticket-sales platform.
The sale of the media properties for an undisclosed amount was facilitated by Venture First, a Louisville-based boutique financial-services firm.
