New Skool Media

Erwin: New Skool Media was founded in 2014 by Rob Koghee and Cor Jan Willig. They quickly acquired nineteen so-called 'special interest' magazine brands from Sanoma, including well-known titles like KIJK, Vorsten, and Seasons. Later, they also acquired several titles from Reed Business, including Elsevier, which has since been rebranded to EW. "I worked at Reed Business myself, and with the portfolio, I moved to New Skool Media. There, after a few months, I took over the role of CEO; Lars Duurinck became CFO."

"The titles of New Skool Media have always performed well and continue to do so. In 2020, Rob and Cor Jan – who no longer had operational roles within the publishing house – indicated that they wanted to put the company up for sale; they wanted to sell their shares and focus on other projects. We then started looking for a suitable party that could guide us through a business sale.

After several conversations, we chose Rembrandt for this. What was the deciding factor for us? Simply the good feeling we had with the people right from the start. Rembrandt was extremely supportive from the very beginning, and I immediately felt that we would start this sales process as a team.

Rembrandt guided us perfectly through every step of the process. What also stood out was that Rembrandt came up with interesting names of potential acquisition candidates; this demonstrated the added value of the international network to which Rembrandt is connected. We were already familiar with the Dutch strategic parties, but there were some surprises among the foreign strategic names. They also introduced us to several interesting financial parties that we didn't know yet.

Ultimately, New Skool Media was sold to the Roularta Media Group from Belgium, and since November 2022, the name Roularta Media Nederland has been used. The choice for Roularta was a very deliberate one; while some other parties only wanted to take over the titles and editorial teams, Roularta immediately expressed their desire to retain the existing staff and build a successful future together. Lars and I have worked extremely hard over the past few years to get the company to where it is now, and we have really pushed our people to go the extra mile with us. It is a comforting feeling that a buyer has no extensive restructuring plans but rather wants to grow further with the current staff.

Rembrandt and we truly formed a team. You notice that you are dealing with experienced professionals who know exactly what they are doing and have managed to achieve the best possible result for us. As a result, we can now continue to contribute positively to the Dutch magazine market."

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