Publisher adds Venice Magazine to portfolio

SARASOTA — Gulfshore Media, publisher of Sarasota Magazine, Biz(941) and several other titles, has purchased Venice Magazine, a five-year-old publication.

Terms of the deal weren't disclosed. Sarasota-based Gulfshore Media, according to a release, will operate the Venice Magazine website and re-launch the publication on a semi-annual basis in November. The magazine, through the entity Venetian Media Group, was previously run by a group of area investors that includes Tracy Knight, founder of Sarasota-based Knight Marketing.

“We've admired Venice Magazine since its inception and are thrilled to enter the south Sarasota County marketplace with such a top quality publication,” Gulfshore Media President and CEO Dan Denton says in the release. “While it will have our own creative stamp, we also intend to carry on what publisher Tracy Knight and her team established, which is a beautiful publication that represents the people and lifestyles of Venice and surrounding communities.”

Gulfshore Media plans to expand the readership and digital distribution, according to the release. That includes targeting readers in and around Venice, areas like Osprey, Nokomis, Manasota Key, Englewood and North Port. The publication will be redesigned, the firm adds.

“We are gratified that our magazine will continue to be published by a respected company with a long and successful track record,” Knight says in the statement. “The readers and advertisers can continue to take pride in the magazine that is for and about them.”

In addition to Sarasota Magazine and Biz(941), Gulfshore Media publishes Sarasota Health, Sarasota Magazine's Home Buyer, SEE Sarasota, Orlando Life, Winter Park Magazine and Orlando Homebuyer. It also handles custom publications and playbills for the Ringling Museum, Sarasota Orchestra, Van Wezel Performing Arts Hall, Westcoast Black Theatre Troupe and the Asolo Repertory Theatre in Sarasota.