July 13 (Bloomberg) -- BusinessWeek, the McGraw-Hill Cos. magazine that lost 30 percent of its advertising revenue in the second quarter, is up for sale, according to a person close to the situation.

McGraw-Hill hired Evercore Partners Inc., the boutique investment bank founded by Roger Altman, to sell BusinessWeek, according to a person close to the situation, who declined to be identified because the information isn’t public. McGraw-Hill, based in New York, said in a statement today it was “exploring strategic options” for the magazine. A representative for Evercore, which is also based in New York, declined to comment.

The recession and competition from the Internet have cut into ad sales at BusinessWeek and competitors. Condé Nast said in April that it was closing its two-year-old Portfolio business magazine after it failed to meet revenue forecasts.

“Magazines are vulnerable to the same decline in advertising revenue that has been hitting the newspaper industry,” said Tom Corbett, a Morningstar Inc. analyst in Chicago. “Because of that, the environment for sales of magazine properties is going to be pretty challenged.”

BusinessWeek was founded in 1929 and has almost 190 editorial staff, according to its Web site. It has about 4.8 million readers weekly in 140 countries. The weekly magazine’s 30 percent decline in second-quarter ad sales, to $43.9 million, compared with a 22 percent drop industrywide, according to Publishers Information Bureau data.

Fewer Pages

U.S. consumer magazines have gotten thinner with the plunge in demand from advertisers. Industrywide ad pages dropped 30 percent in the second quarter with financial, insurance and real estate marketers buying 51 percent fewer pages, according to PIB. Automotive ad pages fell 49 percent, PIB said.

BusinessWeek’s ad pages declined 34 percent in the three months through June, while competitor Fortune posted a 45 percent drop. Forbes had a 40 percent decline, PIB data show.

In the first quarter, total U.S. advertising spending fell 12 percent, led by tumbling demand in newspapers and magazines, after automakers and car dealerships slashed marketing budgets, Nielsen Co. said in June.

BusinessWeek, run by Editor-in-Chief Stephen Adler, was overhauled in 2007 and added stories on new products and personal finance in an effort to attract more readers and advertisers.

McGraw-Hill, also the owner of the Standard & Poor’s ratings company, rose 40 cents, or 1.3 percent, to $30.48 at 4:01 p.m. in New York Stock Exchange composite trading. The stock has gained 31 percent this year.

To contact the reporter on this story: Serena Saitto in New York at ssaitto@bloomberg.net; Greg Bensinger in New York at gbensinger1@bloomberg.net

Last Updated: July 13, 2009 16:24 EDT