Fortune (magazine)

• 1. Introduction

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  Fortune magazine was founded in 1929 by Henry Luce, the same man who had already built Time into a household name. Luce envisioned something entirely new: a publication he called "the Ideal Super-Class Magazine," a "distinguished and de luxe" journal that would vividly portray, interpret, and record what he termed "the Industrial Civilization." The name he originally chose for it was Power. What would it become? How would a magazine born on the eve of the worst economic collapse in American history survive, and then thrive? And why does a list it began publishing in 1955 still shape how the world talks about corporate America today?

• 2. Born in the Crash

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  Luce's business partner Briton Hadden was not enthusiastic about the new magazine idea, but Hadden died suddenly on the 27th of February, 1929, before he could block it. Luce moved forward. What he could not have foreseen was the timing. In late October 1929, the Wall Street crash struck, marking the start of the Great Depression. In a memo to the Time Inc. board that November, Luce wrote plainly: "We will not be over-optimistic. We will recognize that this business slump may last as long as an entire year."

  Fortune made its official debut in February 1930. Parker Lloyd-Smith served as managing editor, and Thomas Maitland Cleland came on as art director. Single copies of the first issue cost one dollar. An urban legend holds that Cleland put that one-dollar price on the cover mockup simply because no one had yet decided what to charge. The magazine was already printed before anyone noticed, and customers who saw it priced at a dollar assumed the content must be worth it. Whether or not that story is true, the issue attracted 30,000 subscribers before it even landed on doorsteps.

  By 1937, that subscriber count had grown to 460,000, and the magazine was recording half a million dollars in annual profit.

• 3. A Magazine Unlike Any Other

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  At a time when business publications meant columns of black-and-white numbers, Fortune was something physically different. Each issue was printed in an oversized 11-by-14-inch format on creamy, heavyweight paper, with full color throughout and a cover produced by a special printing process.

  Leading graphic designers Leo Lionni and Will Burtin both served as art directors during the 1950s and 1960s. The magazine also distinguished itself through photography: Margaret Bourke-White and Ansel Adams both contributed their work to its pages. Walker Evans served as photography editor from 1945 to 1965.

  The writing staff was equally deliberate. During the Great Depression, Fortune built a reputation for social conscience by hiring writers specifically for their literary talent, not their business credentials. James Agee, Archibald MacLeish, John Kenneth Galbraith, and Alfred Kazin all wrote for the magazine. The result was long, in-depth feature articles that set it apart from rivals then and still define its identity today.

• 4. Luce's Expanding Empire

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  Fortune was not Henry Luce's only ambition. Time had launched in 1923, and Fortune followed in 1930. Luce then added Life in 1936 and Sports Illustrated in 1954, building one of the most influential media empires of the twentieth century. Fortune became a load-bearing pillar of that structure, delivering prestige and profit in a category none of his other titles occupied.

  The magazine's publishing rhythm shifted over the decades as the media landscape changed. From its launch in 1930 through 1978, it appeared monthly. In January 1978 it moved to a biweekly schedule. By October 2009, citing falling advertising revenue and declining circulation, it pulled back to once every three weeks. By 2018, the publication had settled at 14 issues per year.

• 5. The Lists That Define an Era

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  Fortune has published the Fortune 500 every year since 1955, ranking American companies by gross revenue. The list became so embedded in business culture that "Fortune 500 company" is now a shorthand for corporate scale recognized around the world. The magazine extended the concept globally with the Fortune Global 500, and regionally with the Fortune India 500, Fortune China 500, and Fortune Southeast Asia 500.

  Beyond the revenue rankings, Fortune publishes dozens of other lists: 100 Best Companies to Work For, the 40 Under 40, the World's Most Admired Companies, the Future 50, and the Unicorn List, among others. Managing editor Marshall Loeb, who took the role in 1986, is credited with broadening the magazine's traditional focus. During his tenure he added graphs, charts, and tables, and pushed articles on topics such as executive life, the effectiveness of public schools, and homelessness into the mix alongside standard business coverage.

• 6. Ownership and the Digital Turn

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  For the years between 1990 and 2014 when Time Warner owned Time Inc., Fortune articles were hosted alongside those from Money magazine at CNNMoney.com. When Time Inc. spun off from its corporate parent in June 2014, Fortune launched its own standalone website at Fortune.com.

  Ownership then changed hands twice in quick succession. On the 26th of November, 2017, Meredith Corporation announced it would acquire Time Inc. in a deal worth 2.8 billion dollars. That acquisition closed on the 31st of January, 2018. Less than a year later, on the 9th of November, 2018, Meredith announced it was selling Fortune to Thai billionaire Chatchaval Jiaravanon for 150 million dollars. Jiaravanon is a member of Thailand's wealthiest family and is affiliated with the Charoen Pokphand Group, a Thailand-based conglomerate with holdings in agriculture, telecommunications, retail, pharmaceuticals, and finance.

  Since March 2020, access to Fortune.com has been restricted by a paywall. In July 2025, the magazine laid off ten percent of its staff. At that time it had 360 full-time employees.

• 7. Editors Who Shaped the Voice

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  Fortune has had twenty top editors since Luce conceived it in 1929. Parker Lloyd-Smith, the first managing editor, served from 1929 to 1931. The title of the top editorial role changed over the decades. Following the elimination of the editor-in-chief role at Time Inc. in October 2013, the position was redesignated simply as "editor" in 2014, before reverting to "editor-in-chief" in later years.

  Alyson Shontell has held the editor-in-chief title since 2021. Her tenure coincides with the paywall era and the ownership structure under Fortune Media Group Holdings, the global business media company that now publishes the magazine from its headquarters in New York City. Fortune Indonesia, a regional edition led by Editor-in-Chief Hendra Soeprajitno, extends the brand into Southeast Asia in both print and digital form.