The Rake Magazine Shutters

Loss of advertising dollars has claimed another victim. The owners of Minneapolis-based monthly magazine the Rake announced Monday that the March issue would be its last.

In a meeting with staffers, publisher Tom Bartel cited a lack of advertising revenue and increasing costs of printing and production as the reasons behind the decision. "There is nothing wrong with The Rake other than the bottom line," he wrote in a post on the magazine's Web site.

The Rake will continue to publish online with its "Secrets of the Day" e-mails, event calendar, searchable restaurant database and select blogs. Bartel could not immediately be reached for comment.

Bartel launched the magazine in 2002 as a sort of literary answer to Minnesota's alt-weeklies. It had a controlled circulation of 60,000 in the Twin Cities metro area.

The Rake joins a growing list of small, well-regarded, ad-dependent magazines to fold. Earlier this week, FOLIO: reported that country music magazine No Depression will fold after its May-June issue. The magazine's founders attributed the demise to declining advertising revenues, which were down 30 to 40 percent, they said.

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