Hammock is proud to be playing a role in the world’s largest quilting event, the International Quilt Festival, going on today and this weekend in Houston. More than 30,000 attendees to the prestigious festival will be receiving a copy of the September/October issue of American Spirit, the magazine we publish for the Daughters of the American Revolution. The issue features a preview of the DAR Museum‘s festival exhibit, “DAR Presents: Quilts of a Young Country.”
In addition to the cover story of the issue celebrating quilt art and spotlighting the 20 DAR quilts on display at the festival, Hammock also designed several ads for The Texas Society Daughters of the American Revolution (TSDAR) to run in the festival’s program.
“I’m excited because the DAR quilt exhibit promotes the preservation of a part of our American heritage that is very connected to our families and is connected generationally,” says Jill Brooks, exhibit co-chair for the TSDAR. “Perhaps because it’s tactile, there seems to be something special about quilting and the fact that it’s passed down through generations. There’s a comfort factor involved.”
Congrats to the TSDAR for its part in a “show that even Hurricane Ike couldn’t stop!” Here’s to a great festival!

Freakonomics author Stephen Dubner says magazines can learn from air-conditioner companies — which confuses me a little, but it’s something about when independent writers should get paid by magazines for the work they do. While I’m not sure I understand the analogy, I do know that for the past 17 years, Hammock enters into its payment system the invoices of writers — and photographers — “upon acceptance,” not “upon publication.” Publication dates can be months after the photo is shot or article is written and accepted, but that shouldn’t have any impact upon when the contributor gets paid.

We don’t often have the kind of major assignments that involve the long lead times that Stephen describes in his blog post. However, on a few occasions, we have contracted with independent editors and videographers for such projects and set up a relationship that takes into consideration the need to “advance” such individuals for work they are being commissioned to do.

Being fair makes a lot of sense to me.

Always an exception to the rule: I double-checked with our accounting department to make sure our policy adhered to the post I was about to publish. It does. However, on very, very rare occasions, I was told, in the tsk-tsk sort of way that accounting department people are known for, an invoice may disappear into thin air. (Translation: It gets stuck on an editor’s or art director’s desk.) Again, that’s very, very rare. And even more rare now that this post has be made.

It’s hard to believe that Hammock Inc. is 17 years old this month. However, when you publish recurring magazines, it’s easy to prove. We’ve created a Flickr set (or at the end of this post) that includes a magazine cover from each of those years, starting with one from our first year in 1991.

Our client, NFIB, believes strongly that the decisions voters make on Election Day at the polls will have profound effects on their lives—and that the effect is even stronger for those who own or work for a small business. That’s why we dedicated more than half of the pages of the October/November 2008 issue of MyBusiness, the magazine we publish for NFIB, to the election—specifically to the information small business voters should be armed with before making those important decisions on Nov. 4.
For those still trying to make sense of the issues and where the candidates stand, we compiled the reader-friendly Voting for Small Business feature, which outlines the issues (think healthcare, taxes, energy and labor) affecting small business and both Sens. John McCain’s and Barack Obama’s positions on them.

Hammock has a lot of experience with redesign, and our re-imaginings of publications have not only garnered numerous awards, but they’ve also helped our clients recruit and retain members and connect with their readers’ passions. Still, it was cool to have our philosophy on redesign underscored by Kelly McMurray, creative director of the design firm 2communique, at a recent Folio: Show 2008 session in Chicago.

Addressing both editors and designers, she offered these tips for anyone contemplating a redesign:

1. Define why you need to redesign. Is your circulation or readership falling off? Are you taking a new direction editorially? Is the publication too expensive production-wise? Is it not aligned with your reader mission? (If you don’t conduct post-publication reviews of your issues, now is the time to start.)

2. Get everyone’s buy-in. The redesign process needs to be collaborative. That means editors and designers need to figure out ways to speak each other’s language.

3. Complete market research. The more knowledge you have about your readership, the more the redesign will reflect it and align with your readers’ needs.

4. Determine the scope of the redesign. Are you just making minor changes or doing a complete overhaul? Does your team have the right resources and abilities? Can you complete a redesign while keeping up with regular issue demands? Are you too close to step back and be objective, or do you need an outside opinion?

5. Set a reasonable schedule. Commit fully to a launch date, but build in enough time that you resist the temptation to rush through the process.

6. Kickoff the process. Get people away from their desks to discuss elements of the redesign. Be open to inspiration from other magazines: Collect examples of what you do and don’t like.

7. Start tearing down and building back up. Spend lots of time researching typography, color palette, fonts, grid system, navigational systems and style guide. Editors: This is the time to step back and let designers show their talents.

8. Launch the issue. Don’t show your redesign in a piecemeal fashion; get it all out there at once. Build a strong, workable structure, but also make it flexible enough for editors and other designers to take ownership and customize it for future needs.

We work with clients to plan content months ahead of time. It’s not uncommon to write a story on the history of Christmas cookies in June or interview entrepreneurs with summertime businesses in February. This early and detailed planning is just one essential piece of the publication puzzle.

I recently read about an interesting experiment: For the next three months the magazine Good is allowing readers to name their own subscription price. Good is not the first to experiment with the idea. For one month in late 2007, Paste allowed readers to name their subscription price, a program that resulted in 28,000 new paid subscribers. For a consumer magazine like Paste that carries advertising, a circulation increase of 28,000 should translate to a nice chunk of new advertising revenue.

Over the last few years as auditing agencies have enforced stricter requirements on publishers regarding circulation, some publishers have been forced to reduce their rate bases to pass their audits. Some magazines then find themselves unable to sell as big of an audience to advertisers, so they must find new ways to boost circulation. This partially explains why an annual subscription to a magazine can sometimes cost less than a single copy of an issue on newsstands. (Mr. Magazine Samir Husni shares his take on single copy vs. subscription sales on his blog.)

Before you consider instituting this kind of program with your magazine, consider: What are the risks of allowing new readers to tell you what your magazine is worth to them? Will these readers be more or less engaged with your magazine? Will readers who pay the average $20 subscription price feel more vested in the magazine than those who pay $1, or will you end up losing money on them? Each publication’s situation, content, readership and financial realities are unique, but for some magazines, letting their readers rate their worth could be an experiment that could help give those publications the circulation bump they sorely need.

The private equity firm Veronis Suhler Stevenson, specializing in the media, communications and information industries, recently released their annual report on media spending. According to the report, total communications spending is projected to grow 5.4 percent in 2008 to $924 billion. Outsourced custom publishing was one of the eight media segments that exhibited double-digit growth from 2002-2007. Along with word-of mouth marketing, pure-play Internet and mobile services, branded entertainment, out-of-home media, professional and business information services, VSS predicts that custom publishing will continue its growth momentum over the next five years, resulting in a solid decade of double-digit gains.