In the very first issue of the U.S. version of “Penthouse Magazine” in September, 1979, our founder Bob Guccione not surprisingly wrote the first note from the editor in a section entitled Housecall.
What About Playboy?
Before you say to yourself “What kind of a magazine is this that dares to compete with Playboy?”. we want to say it for you. We want to record our awareness that Penthouse is, in many respects, similar to its much-revered American counterpart before you feel obliged to do it for us. But there are other considerations or differences you may not be aware of-and, with a little gentle patience on your part, we’d like to enumerate them for you.
Penthouse began life as a British magazine. It was the very first in its field-founded in London four and a half years ago by this writer, an American artist of distinguished anonymity, no publishing experience and even less money. He, along with a small, embattled and bewildered staff of mixed nationalities and common interests paid for the honor of being “first in the field” in the thickest skirmish of all — fighting for the right to publish the kind of revolutionary words and pictures that brought us unhappily to trial. We lost our case, of course-, but went right on publishing the same words and the same pictures until the sheer volume of our readership won for us the grudging respect and authority in Establishment-orientated England that Playboy now enjoys in America.
Today, having unwittingly proven once again that might is right. Penthouse has become the all-time, biggest selling quality magazine in the history of British publishing. An accomplishment that bears direct comparison to the likes of Life or Look or the late Saturday Evening Post rather than Playboy. In France, where Penthouse competes on neutral territory with these as well as other of the world’s finest publications, it is now the largest selling non-French periodical in any category. And in every other country in which it is sold. Penthouse is among the top three best-selling English-language titles.
To further compound the enigma of our success. the issue you hold in your hands marks the first time a British-based periodical has ever attempted to challenge an American rival on home ground. Which says something for our unshakable belief in the universality of male interests. as well as bringing us right back ’round to our first point — what about Playboy?
The simple fact is that we are probably less interested in them than they are in us, and perhaps the best way to qualify our apparently intrusive behavior is to state not only why we are here, but now that we are here, what do we have to offer?
For a start, the assumption that an affluent nation of 200 million people constitutes a market big enough and lush enough to support two magazines of the same genre provides us with all the economic rationalization we need. Add to this the material fact that we are the first and only English-language magazine of our type ever to outsell Playboy anywhere in the world and you will learn whence we get our heart.
Now we all know that Playboy occupies a position of absolute autocracy in the men’s field. It has no competition — neither a smear nor a smell as far as the eye can see. The closest contender to its walloping 4.8 million sale on the American scene is a long faltering, if not already exhausted, also-ran at something less than 200,000. The gap is unnatural. not to mention unhealthy — nor does it exist anywhere else in publishing.
Playboy, like all ·things quintessentially American. needs a competitor and Penthouse is the only magazine around whose performance. quality, and editorial temperament qualify it for the job.
And we have something specific to offer in our own right. Penthouse is not a parochial magazine, nor will it ever become simply reflective of the time and place in which we live. It is a fighter. a leader and an innovator. Born — not of the relatively placid Playboy epoch of the early ’50s but of the age of the social. Moral, and intellectual revolution of the ’60s. We are a child of the permissive society — the first major periodical to-be created out of this unique, sometimes incongruous, but perennially dynamic era. We have none of the sexual hang-ups of the lingering and fundamentally Puritan tradition of Playboy. We report rather than preach and, whereas our own success has made us equally responsible editorially, the only Penthouse philosophy you’re likely to encounter can be summed up in four immaculate and meaningful words: “To each his own.”
Apart from this, Penthouse — with fully operational editorial sales and circulation offices in London and New York. bureaus in Paris. Rome. Geneva, Berlin. Budapest, Tel Aviv. Saigon and Rio de Janeiro — becomes the first-ever truly international magazine for men.
From this vantage point, we intend to inform, amuse and generally cater for the expanding international consciousness of the American male. More people are traveling for business or pleasure today than ever before. Our ethnic, political and geographic frontiers are falling as the world shrinks — not only in the time-space continuum of travel and communications. but in our cultural and economic links as well.
So this, in a nutshell, is where we’re at. This is our scene and, given a brief opportunity to get our bearings, we intend to develop it further and cover it better than anyone else. As far as Playboy is concerned, we’ve said our piece as honestly and directly as we know how. We’re here to stay, and if you still have any doubts or questions write to us — or write to them. Either way the answer should be interesting. — B.G.
And there we have it. Thus, all this craziness began nearly 60 years ago on this continent. Granted, it requires a little savoir-faire to tell the 800-lb gorilla in the room that they need to worry about you more than you need to worry about them, but whatever our shortcomings over the years, lack of confidence has never been one of them. … Honestly, you can still see that evidenced in many of the (often seeming interminable) meetings at high levels we still have today. You can find other thoughts on history throughout these now digital pages, but “Magazine Monument” and “Pageant Pomp” would be good places to continue.
By the way, should you find yourself curious about the — definitely not Playboy — illustrations used today, those happen to be the first four U.S. Pets from way back in 1969. As you consider Evelyn, Kelly, Ulla, and Kipper, know that it was not all that easy to find photos of these women wearing clothes in those issues. Apparently, Bob had a definite point of view with his new venture. … You might also be interested to know that their entire issues are up for perusal in our new “Library” site — even though the Millennials and GenZ on our staff really hate that term. Seriously, if you say “card catalogue” or “Dewey Decimal System” to them, it’s like you’re speaking an alien tongue. The others of us tell them to Google it.
