SEE ONE YEAR NOTE AT THE BOTTOM OF THE POST
Time rolled along, and then in August of '05 Katrina hit NOLA. Magazine subscriptions were the last thing on people's minds, and for a couple of months I held my breath and scrapped together money to print another issue.
In 2008, there was another hit, as everyone knew at least one person who lost their job. Maybe it happened to you. Every few days I checked to be sure the website was still functioning.
So here we are with the COVID-19 virus, and we're looking at anywhere
from a couple weeks to 18 months of social distancing, people out of
work, and a worrisome economy.
I already announced in the current issue that we'd be switching to PDF in a year. A lot of you went ahead and switched over early. That timeline has to change.
The May/June issue will go to the printer at the end of the week (unless I hear otherwise from them), and it will be the last PRINTED issue.
The website has already been changed over. We will add an issue or two to even out the $ on subscriptions already purchased. We are planning to do something special on the months that are not an issue months (Jan, Mar, May, July, Sept, Nov are issues). It could be a lot of different things, but the in person interviews might not happen for a while. Advertisers will get mentions in the off month offerings.
Honestly, I've been here before (more than once) and don't have the reserves to continue printing after this issue. But we will still put out a great magazine and I hope you'll stick with us!
April 21 '21
Yesterday we emailed out the 7th digital only Essential Herbal.
Now that COVID is starting to look like there might be an end in sight, we're getting emails about going back to print issues, but we didn't switch over because of the plague.
We'd already planned it and written about it in the Mar/Apr '20 issue...
"In the past few issues, we’ve lost some big advertisers, and I can’t say I blame them (especially the lucky retiree). Today’s shoppers don’t want to type in a URL, they want to click a button. I get it. The problem with that is that they were paying for the printing of a couple of issues each year, and that now has to come out of the subscriptions. As it was, printing and shipping ate ½ of the cost of a subscription, and we’ve never gone much over 1000. A little math will tell you how that works out. Thank goodness for our PDF subscribers!"
In other words, it was go digital or shut it down. I started the magazine as a hobby. It wasn't about making money (although I won't lie and say it wasn't a dream) but it HAD to pay for itself. Somewhere along the line I forgot that, and felt that as long as the business covered the magazine, it was okay - never really considering the need to make a living.
I have shuddered many times in the past year, thinking about how our readers could write to us if a magazine was late and we would send a replacement. When the mail slowed down weeks and months, that would have destroyed me personally - having to reprint and re-mail entire issues.
The bottom line is that as much as we would like to, there will never again be a printed Essential Herbal Magazine. The digital and the EXTRA! are coming along nicely, though!
I already announced in the current issue that we'd be switching to PDF in a year. A lot of you went ahead and switched over early. That timeline has to change.
The May/June issue will go to the printer at the end of the week (unless I hear otherwise from them), and it will be the last PRINTED issue.
The website has already been changed over. We will add an issue or two to even out the $ on subscriptions already purchased. We are planning to do something special on the months that are not an issue months (Jan, Mar, May, July, Sept, Nov are issues). It could be a lot of different things, but the in person interviews might not happen for a while. Advertisers will get mentions in the off month offerings.
Honestly, I've been here before (more than once) and don't have the reserves to continue printing after this issue. But we will still put out a great magazine and I hope you'll stick with us!
April 21 '21
Yesterday we emailed out the 7th digital only Essential Herbal.
Now that COVID is starting to look like there might be an end in sight, we're getting emails about going back to print issues, but we didn't switch over because of the plague.
We'd already planned it and written about it in the Mar/Apr '20 issue...
"In the past few issues, we’ve lost some big advertisers, and I can’t say I blame them (especially the lucky retiree). Today’s shoppers don’t want to type in a URL, they want to click a button. I get it. The problem with that is that they were paying for the printing of a couple of issues each year, and that now has to come out of the subscriptions. As it was, printing and shipping ate ½ of the cost of a subscription, and we’ve never gone much over 1000. A little math will tell you how that works out. Thank goodness for our PDF subscribers!"
In other words, it was go digital or shut it down. I started the magazine as a hobby. It wasn't about making money (although I won't lie and say it wasn't a dream) but it HAD to pay for itself. Somewhere along the line I forgot that, and felt that as long as the business covered the magazine, it was okay - never really considering the need to make a living.
I have shuddered many times in the past year, thinking about how our readers could write to us if a magazine was late and we would send a replacement. When the mail slowed down weeks and months, that would have destroyed me personally - having to reprint and re-mail entire issues.
The bottom line is that as much as we would like to, there will never again be a printed Essential Herbal Magazine. The digital and the EXTRA! are coming along nicely, though!
No comments:
Post a Comment