 Holt sold the magazine to businessman Larry Archibald in 1982 for $5,000 (paid in fifty $100 bills), who expanded the magazine, hired a large staff, and eventually increased "Stereophile's" circulation to 60,000 readers by the late 1980s.The magazine was sold to Petersen Publishing in June 1998.The success of "Stereophile" in the late 1960s and early 1970s inspired New York writer & reviewer Harry Pearson to start a rival publication, The Absolute Sound, which quickly became a very influential high-end magazine.