Coincidence? Wal-Mart just dumped the three "lad mags" for being a little too much like Playboy. Playboy announces its "lad mag" makeover:

Playboy's new editor James Kaminsky says he's got a magazine for you.

After months of nips and tucks to stop the signs of aging at the 50-year-old publication, founded by sexual revolution icon Hugh Hefner, Playboy is fresh from its makeover.

Kaminsky, 42, told Reuters he is ready to showcase a magazine that is similar in substance but different in style — and put some of the clothes back on.

With a new editorial staff, Kaminsky and Playboy magazine, owned by Playboy Enterprises Inc., are set to recapture the throne that Hefner, now 77, refuses to abdicate. The magazine lost ground on newsstands with the arrival in the late 90s of so-called "lad mags" like Maxim, Stuff and FHM.

The new formula? More photos teamed with still strong journalism, more lifestyle, leisure and fashion and more pictorials of celebrities with perhaps a bit more clothes.

"My goal is to take this great editorial package that has worked for 50 years and move it forward for a new generation, without losing the things that have worked so well to date," Kaminsky said in an interview.

....With Maxim, FHM and Stuff crowding the newsstands and the industry facing the worst advertising slump in recent history, Playboy's newsstand sales suffered and its glossy reputation dulled.


There is "a lot more color. It hits you, it's not subtle," McAlpine said about the revamped magazine. "The editorial content is still there. It may actually make the older reader feel younger. And that's a positive."

....Kaminsky was lured from Maxim in September to replace Arthur Kretchmer, Playboy's editorial boss for nearly four decades. But how do you resculpt the magazine without it appearing like it's in mid-life crisis?

"We need to add new people on the newsstand ... by making the magazine more visual, making it livelier and relevant," Kaminsky said. "It's an evolution, not a revolution. I don't want to lose those 2.8 million" subscribers to the magazine.

....Playboy's pictorials with well-known movie and TV stars in the buff have always been among their best selling issues, but getting A-list actresses, singers and models to appear totally nude has been difficult.

Kaminsky has brought in Heidi Parker, formerly an editor for Movie Line magazine, as the magazine's West Coast editor in a move to add more names to the bow-tied bunny's little black book. [Reuters]