Evolve Buys Martini in Push for Luxury Content

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Evolve Media has purchased Martini Media, a San Francisco advertising agency targeting the luxury market in a move to position itself as a one-stop shop for marketers.

“Evolve is a lifestyle publisher and we’ve been operating solely between male and female lifestyle for quite a while. Martini allows us an opportunity to add a new leg to the stool,” said Brian Fitzgerald, co-founder and president of Evolve Media. “It gives us an opportunity to service a broader base of marketers.”

Though Martini has been functioning as a creative agency and advertising seller for a network of luxury sites, such as cooking website Saveur and luxury lifestyle magazine the Robb Report, Evolve plans to use Martini’s knowledge to transform it into a luxury publishing company in the next 12 months, Fitzgerald said. Martini’s 33 employees will all stay on, boosting Evolve’s employee count to 415. The terms of the acquisition were not disclosed.

The purchase of Martini is the latest in a series of buys the Los Angeles company has made in the last 12 months as it has brought its portfolio of lifestyle sites to 30.

“Marketers and their agencies want to work with fewer partners that give them size and efficiency. That’s really Evolve’s play,” said Fitzgerald.

Much of Evolve’s size comes from its two largest websites, female lifestyle site TotallyHer and male lifestyle site CraveOnline, which combined are bringing in more than 100 million unique visitors each month, the company said. Evolve’s 2014 revenue topped $100 million.

To add to its scale, Evolve has opted to buy complementary media companies rather than build them internally.

“Building is extremely difficult. Trying to find the editors and people that have the right voice and that people can truly connect with is extremely difficult. It’s trying to capture lightening in a bottle,” said Fitzgerald. “It’s better to identify those people who are doing it well and then partner with them going forward.”

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