People (magazine) members regularly slept on the floor of their offices two or three nights each week and severely limited all non-essential outside engagements. The premier edition for the week ending March 4, 1974 featured actress Mia Farrow, then starring in the film "The Great Gatsby", on the cover. That issue also featured stories on Gloria Vanderbilt, Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn and the wives of U.S. Vietnam veterans who were Missing In Action. The magazine was, apart from its cover, printed in black-and-white. The initial cover price was 35 cents (). The core of the small founding editorial team included other editors, writers, photographers
People (magazine) veteran. Stolley characterized the magazine as "getting back to the people who are causing the news and who are caught up in it, or deserve to be in it. Our focus is on people, not issues." Stolley's almost religious determination to keep the magazine people-focused contributed significantly to its rapid early success. It is said that although Time Inc. pumped an estimated $40 million into the venture, the magazine only broke even 18 months after its debut in March 1974. Initially, the magazine was sold primarily on newsstands and in supermarkets. To get the magazine out each week, founding staff