When FHM beamed an image of a naked Gail Porter on to the Houses of Parliament back in May 1999, nothing seemed beyond the reach of the lads’ mag. The formula — girls, humour, gadgets and sport — had been invented only five years before, but it discovered a willing audience of men that had not, it was thought, been willing to buy a magazine.

At the time, FHM had a monthly circulation of more than 700,000; but figures this week show how much times have changed. Circulation for the Emap flagship is down 25.9 per cent in the second half of 2006 to 371,263.

Nor is the damage limited to the market leader; all the lad’s monthlies — IPC’s Loaded, the original enfant terrible, and Dennis Publishing’s Maxim had near 30 per cent falls. Felix Dennis, the owner of the title, announced plans to sell the US edition and the masthead worldwide; in an indication that owners are worried about the health of the sector.

Even that does not complete the picture: the two weeklies, which had been expected to expand the market, both fell. Emap’s Zoo (coverline: “100 Hottest Webcam Babes”) was down by a fifth, while IPC’s Nuts, which promises the reader an “incredible boob bonanza inside” slipped 3.8 per cent, a performance sustained by a couple of half-price issues.

The publishers, though, do their best to brush off the sagging figures. Bruce Sandell, the UK managing director of Dennis Publishing, says that “the men’s lifestyle sector is still 20 per cent ahead of where it was before the launch of the men’s weeklies.” For a while, the monthlies held up, but, according to Eric Fuller, managing director of IPC Ignite, home to Nuts and Loaded, “there came a point last year where people are finding that the need to have both a weekly and a monthly is less than it was”.

On current trends, it is likely that Zoo will overtake FHM as the No 1 title in the sector, and publishers say it is perfectly possible to make money from titles that circulated at less than 100,000, although promotion will have to be limited and costs cut. But the future is not quite as dismal as that.

Perhaps men are going more upmarket. The more robust titles are Men’s Health and GQ, the high-end monthly, both of which recorded modest gains. Mr Fuller certainly criticises Zoo for going too downmarket. “We are careful to have a sense of humour, to wink at the reader, and not thrust our crotch in his face; we don’t put adult stars on our covers,” he insists, although to the casual eye the distinction is a fine one.

Marcus Rich, the managing director who runs, Emap’s men’s titles, defends the use of what he calls “crossover stars” and points out that “while the ABC figures look tough”, he would be a lot more worried if Emap had not diversifed into television, internet and online.

Emap calculates that FHM reaches 7 million a month, including 1.6 million monthly vistors to FHM.com, 2.6 million who catch the TV channel, 250,000 mobile users, and multiple magazine readers.

Digital accounts for “over 10 per cent” of FHM’s revenues and growing, but the problem is that advertising yields are lower: a print publication can charge £20 per thousand readers; online that drops sharply.

Rich says that Emap is seeing “growth in reach and growth in digital revenues”, but what he can’t say is that overall revenues are going up. Some men’s magazines derive

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