The advent of aggressive marketing by magazines to garner subscribers seems to be a tactic to raise the falling rate of subscriptions. One of the main reasons for the low volume in subscriptions for magazine companies is that the internet is acting as a source of information for many people and they turn to the online versions of the publications which are usually free. Furthermore, the habit of reading is fast eroding in people and books and magazines publishers have to face the brunt of it.
It would also be safe to say that readers are often confused by the large number of magazines which are available per subject. For example, you might find close to twenty magazines competing for space at the newsstand when it comes to health and beauty. A similar case exists for subjects such as computers, Hollywood etc. This creates confusion in the mind of the reader and he or she may just leave the newsstand without picking up any magazine and in this manner subscription numbers keep dwindling over a period of time.
After having defined some of the key reasons why magazine subscriptions are going down, it might not be correct to say that they are totally going of fashion. The subscribers may have converted to online subscribers or readers, but they still add to the total readership count of the magazine. Many readers, who have continued to be faithful to magazine subscription companies, subscribe to them religiously. In fact some readers may be as old as seventy years old, but they still want their regular magazines to be subscribed to in an ongoing manner.