Mr. Magazine

A Mr. Magazine™ Launch Story

“We had the print background and we believed in that. Also, with everything we were reading and researching, we felt that print is strong. I know it’s taken a pretty bad beating over the past several years, but really in the past two years we’ve seen a great surge in print again. And for us we felt that it’s almost not real until it’s in print. The digital is fantastic and we certainly have full digital; we’re doing a lot with video, and I like to say that we drive it all to our digital. We have a tangible lead behind that people want and we bring it all together with events.” Daniel Hall

Two new print titles have recently hit newsstands: Celebrity Page and Bella L.A. Both are from the creative talents of husband and wife team, Daniel and Courtenay Hall. The Hall’s began their passionate magazine journey with Bella New York, a women’s luxury lifestyle publication offering an insider’s guide to one of the most affluent areas in America. Bella New York spotlights a sophisticated combination of fashion, beauty, health, philanthropy, arts and culture, cuisine, celebrity and entertainment.

Bella L.A. is the latest regional title that will mirror its sister publication, only focusing on L.A. instead of the Big Apple. I spoke with Daniel Hall recently and we talked about his future vision for the Bella Media Group brand and how he and Courtenay hope to keep spinning the North American globe by having Bella’s for many, many cities. Next up: Miami.

The other new title is one that is unique in its desire to cast celebrities in a more positive light: Celebrity Page, named after the syndicated entertainment news program that airs on the cable network, REELZ. The magazine is a monthly that showcases many of the philanthropic efforts that celebrities are interested in. It also presents a more comfortable look at some of our greatest and most popular icons. It’s a breath of fresh air in the celeb world as it shies away from the behind-the-bushes-caught-you negativity many of the gossip-based titles go for. Daniel’s unique strategy for distributing the premiere issue was an exclusive deal with Barnes & Noble, which earned him first-shelf placement in the Entertainment section in all 634 stores as a joint partnership. While it was a most sweet deal, Daniel said for following issues it will not be Barnes & Noble exclusively as they plan on broadening their horizons and newsstands.

Daniel is a print lover from way back, as is his wife, Courtenay. They used their passion and their own money to start Bella New York and have watched it grow and flourish – so much so they started Bella L.A. and Celebrity Page.

So, I hope that you enjoy this very interesting discussion with a man who knows how to use hard work, passion and dedication to make his dream come true – the Mr. Magazine™ interview with Daniel Hall, publisher, Celebrity Page, Bella New York and Bella L.A.

But first the sound-bites:

On why he’s launching print magazines in this digital age: By design, when we came up with the idea for Bella, we knew that we wanted to go to national with a bunch of regionals, if you will. Bella New York was our first magazine, obviously, and it’s been just a little over five years and we’re going onto Bella L.A. and because 50 percent of the content will be of national interest and the other 50 percent of the content is going to be geared toward that region. And we chose that model because we did not want to compete against the nationals; we didn’t want to have our fashion compete against Vogue. So, we said that if we take a little bit of the nationals and put it into a regional and then let that region own it with some local content, we felt like we’d have better success, because through our research we felt niche publications were doing better.

On the idea behind Celebrity Page magazine and its connection to the television program of the same name: Basically, we’ve partnered with the people who actually have Celebrity Page TV. Of course, we’re not partners with them on the television show, just on the print and the digital. We saw an area where we wanted to position celebrities in a positive light. We wanted to show their philanthropic efforts; we didn’t want to come across as a tabloid that was hiding in the bushes and seeing who was coming out of a cellulite clinic or anything like that.

On why he decided to go through Barnes & Noble exclusively for the distribution of the premiere issue of Celebrity Page: We have a great relationship with Barnes & Noble when it comes to Bella. And our sales are fantastic with them, so I approached them and asked if they’d want to partner with us on this launch. According to what they told me, this was the first time they had entered into this type arrangement too. I was able to negotiate first-shelf placement in the Entertainment section in all 634 stores as a joint partnership. And we said that through the TV and through the magazine, we would also promote Barnes & Noble and just try to drive readers and traffic to their retail outlets to help promote the store and really, just help everyone’s cause.

On what he believes the role of print is today: We had the print background and we believed in that. Also, with everything we were reading and researching, we felt that print s strong. I know it’s taken a pretty bad beating over the past several years, but really in the past two years we’ve seen a great surge in print again. And for us we felt that it’s almost not real until it’s in print. The digital is fantastic and we certainly have full digital; we’re doing a lot with video, and I like to say that we drive it all to our digital. We have a tangible leave behind that people want and we bring it all together with events.

On the biggest stumbling block that he had to face during the launch of any of his magazines and how he overcame it: Two things come to mind: the naysayers who kept saying print is dead and we were absolutely crazy to go into a print publication. Had we listened to any of those people we obviously wouldn’t have launched any of our magazines. So, I think overcoming all of the naysayers just as we were starting to do our preliminary research on what we should do and how we should launch. The second thing was the finances of launching. We did not go after investors. My wife and I self-funded. We like to say it was an Amex card and a dream. And literally it was. We sold the first issue on the concept; we printed a media kit and we sold the idea.

On where the next Bella magazine will be after New York and L.A.: As far as our business model, we plan on going to Miami next. And we’re hoping to do that in one year’s time. Miami and then next, and I’m not sure why really, but we felt we wanted to do something in either Dallas or Houston, something along those lines as a fourth market.

On the most pleasant moment he encountered during the launching of the magazines: I graduated from the Fashion Institute of Technology (FIT) in 1997 with a B.A.and I had the opportunity to go back and interview the president of the college for the magazine. And it’s those types of things that hit me sometimes and I can’t really believe they’re happening, and interviewing some of these amazing athletes and just having exposure and being able to highlight them. With Bella too, we’re fashion, beauty, wellness; we’re an overall lifestyle, those are just three of the main focuses of the magazine. And even a lot of the wellness content; when you’re highlighting these philanthropic efforts of some of these unfortunate diseases and things some children have; when we support them and we go to these fundraisers and highlight and try to help them create awareness; that is meaningful to us.

On anything else he’d like to add: I’d just like to thank our supporters and thank our team. We’re a small crew that does a lot. And really, everything that we do is to just try and put good content to each of those areas and basically don’t stop. Bella is an example of what passion and dedication can do.

On what someone would find him doing if they showed up unexpectedly to his home one evening: We have three small children, not so small now; they’re 12, 11 and 7. Being that we work together, we try when we come home to turn it off. And sometimes that’s difficult, because obviously, you’re always thinking of something. What needs to be done? But we really try to focus and get home and then zone in on what’s important at that point. For the most part it would be being with the children, doing something, whether it’s afterschool soccer, or just being home. It’s really family time that we focus on and we try to really pay attention to doing good quality family time and during the day good quality business.

On what keeps him up at night: I have to say that I am a good sleeper, so when it is bedtime, I can typically shut it down and go to sleep. But when I am kept up it’s just all of the activities of what we’re doing. I don’t want to ever take anything for granted. Life is short for all of us, so at night I try to really think of whether or not we accomplished what we wanted to? I think of strategic ways that we can do better to make a bigger impact on people that is going to be meaningful and to help them. We try and make the content more than just fluff. We try to make a difference with the brand when people are reading the pages of Bella and Celebrity Page.

And now the lightly edited transcript of the Mr. Magazine™ interview with Daniel Hall, publisher, Celebrity Page, Bella New York and Bella L.A.

Samir Husni: Why are you launching a new print magazine in this digital age? And in fact, with Bella L.A., you’re actually launching two print magazines; tell me a little about your story.

Daniel Hall: By design, when we came up with the idea for Bella, we knew that we wanted to go to national with a bunch of regionals, if you will. Bella New York was our first magazine, obviously, and it’s been just a little over five years and we’re going onto Bella L.A. and because 50 percent of the content will be of national interest and the other 50 percent of the content is going to be geared toward that region.

And we chose that model because we did not want to compete against the nationals; we didn’t want to have our fashion compete against Vogue. So, we said that if we take a little bit of the nationals and put it into a regional and then let that region own it with some local content, we felt like we’d have better success, because through our research we felt niche publications were doing better. And we’re not niche in the sense of a special interest type of publication; we’re still more general interest. We are appealing to the masses.

But we knew by focusing on each region it would allow them to own it and hopefully want to purchase it, and it has been. Thank God it has been going that way. It’s been a real grass roots effort, but it’s certainly been gaining momentum issue after issue, and we felt it was time to launch Bella L.A. now in order to keep that momentum going.

Samir Husni: In addition to Bella, you’ve just launched Celebrity Page. And you’ve launched it in a way that it’s only distributed at Barnes & Noble. Would you tell me about the genesis of the idea behind Celebrity Page, the magazine and its connectivity with the television program?

Daniel Hall: Basically, we’ve partnered with the people who actually have Celebrity Page TV. Of course, we’re not partners with them on the television show, just on the print and the digital. We saw an area where we wanted to position celebrities in a positive light. We wanted to show their philanthropic efforts; we didn’t want to come across as a tabloid that was hiding in the bushes and seeing who was coming out of a cellulite clinic or anything like that.

Being that celebrities are such icons really, if you will, to some of the millennials and to older folks as well and the impact that celebrities have on people’s lives; we felt that by putting a positive spin on it and by putting something new out there, and with the TV component to back it up and the full digital, it would be something good to partner on, and be great to add to the Bella Media Group portfolio as just a positive reinforcement to these celebrities of highlighting and honoring them for what they do in that positive way.

Samir Husni: Why did you decide to go through Barnes & Noble exclusively with the premiere launch of Celebrity Page?

Daniel Hall: We have a great relationship with Barnes & Noble when it comes to Bella. And our sales are fantastic with them, so I approached them and asked if they’d want to partner with us on this launch. According to what they told me, this was the first time they had entered into this type arrangement too. I was able to negotiate first-shelf placement in the Entertainment section in all 634 stores as a joint partnership. And we said that through the TV and through the magazine, we would also promote Barnes & Noble and just try to drive readers and traffic to their retail outlets to help promote the store and really, just help everyone’s cause.

We felt it was a good partnership for us. Barnes & Noble is obviously a great name, and you know better than anyone, as far as newsstands go, that they have certainly been struggling over that past few years, but our stand sales are great and we felt that if we could really promote one place and tell people: hey, go here, get it here, it would be very effective.

We are rolling out with another national distributor after this initial first issue, so it’s not going to be exclusive with Barnes & Noble anymore. We are going to increase with additional stands as well, and that will be through The Publishing Distribution. We’ve signed up with those guys as well. But for the launch we went with Barnes & Noble exclusively and it went great. We’re doing a lot of cross-promotion with them. We’re just trying to get people who shop there to purchase our magazine, obviously, but also any title.

Samir Husni: Someone might wonder what you’d been drinking to publish three print magazines in this digital age. What do you believe the role of print is today?

Daniel Hall: I come from a print background. And so does my wife. My wife Courtenay is the editor in chief of the magazine and I’m the publisher, so it’s a husband and wife combo. We met in college at our first job with an advertising agency. My wife jumped over to publishing first and I followed.

So, we had the print background and we believed in that. Also, with everything we were reading and researching, we felt that print s strong. I know it’s taken a pretty bad beating over the past several years, but really in the past two years we’ve seen a great surge in print again. And for us we felt that it’s almost not real until it’s in print. The digital is fantastic and we certainly have full digital; we’re doing a lot with video, and I like to say that we drive it all to our digital. We have a tangible leave behind that people want and we bring it all together with events.

But what we felt in print was exactly that; the tangible leave behind. The celebrities are very supportive and to give you an example, I think it was in our second issue, we highlighted a health expert. Tragically, she was on her deathbed about two months ago. Her niece called me and asked for copies of that issue of the magazine so that they could pass it around to members of the family.

And that just reconfirmed to us the specialness of print; you just can’t get that with digital. You’re not going to have somebody ask you to go get your digital archive so they can see their cover photo. So, I feel the pass-along with print is invaluable. And it’s just real. You have that print copy and these writers, celebrities and editors that we’re highlighting, they take those copies and they keep them forever. We just feel like that when it’s in print, it’s real. We knew that we couldn’t be solely in print, but we wanted to drive it all with the backbone being print. And adding the multiplatform to our brands as supporting everything, but knowing print is still the strongest; it gives the best return on investment and we felt the pass-along rate, as far as having them displayed in doctor’s offices and salons, that type of thing. And print is the most trackable. With digital it’s craziness with all of the numbers; there were a thousand clicks, but did someone walk through my door and purchase the product?

And the brands can get so crafty with print and people love it. You have that diamond ring jumping off of the glossy whit page, it’s just looks gorgeous. And we’re avid magazine readers. From the beginning we knew that we needed to do a print publication, plus the digital and with Celebrity Page, the TV components.

Samir Husni: What was the biggest stumbling block that faced you in the launch of Bella or Celebrity Page and how did you overcome it?

Daniel Hall: Two things come to mind: the naysayers who kept saying print is dead and we were absolutely crazy to go into a print publication. Had we listened to any of those people we obviously wouldn’t have launched any of our magazines. So, I think overcoming all of the naysayers just as we were starting to do our preliminary research on what we should do and how we should launch.

The second thing was the finances of launching. We did not go after investors. My wife and I self-funded. We like to say it was an Amex card and a dream. And literally it was. We sold the first issue on the concept; we printed a media kit and we sold the idea. We were able to sell enough to print our first edition and from there it just continued to roll. We call it an “attic startup,” we launched out of an attic where we lived and it was really a grass roots effort. It was having enough confidence to overcome the naysayers and then being bold enough to sell it before printing, knowing that we had to deliver. I think having our backs against the wall like that, knowing that those challenges really pushed us and motivated us to prove that print was not dead, it’s still very much alive, and you don’t need a big VC (venture capital) company behind you. You need passion, motivation and hustle, and you really can accomplish things and make your dreams come true.

Samir Husni: I interviewed a gentleman who just started a magazine down in New Orleans recently called Art+Design, and he quoted Tennessee Williams in his letter from the publisher, saying: “The United States has three major cities, New York, Los Angeles and New Orleans. And everywhere else is Cleveland.” So, where is the next Bella after New York and L.A.? Is it going to be New Orleans?

Daniel Hall: (Laughs) That’s a good point and it’s certainly a possibility. As far as our business model, we plan on going to Miami next. And we’re hoping to do that in one year’s time. Miami and then next, and I’m not sure why really, but we felt we wanted to do something in either Dallas or Houston, something along those lines as a fourth market.

Miami would be next. And that’s the beauty of it. The content when we designed Bella and we were putting the departments in place and how we would structure it, we knew that was the direction that we wanted. That with each magazine we could have different covers or we could have one cover across all titles and then still have our “Love in the City” and our “Chow Bella,” which is our food section, geared specifically toward that major market. That’s our idea. So, hopefully, God willing, Miami will be our next market.

Samir Husni: During the process of launching those magazines, what was the most pleasant moment that you encountered?

Daniel Hall: I graduated from the Fashion Institute of Technology (FIT) in 1997 with a B.A. and I had the opportunity to go back and interview the president of the college for the magazine. And it’s those types of things that hit me sometimes and I can’t really believe they’re happening, and interviewing some of these amazing athletes and just having exposure and being able to highlight them.

With Bella too, we’re fashion, beauty, wellness; we’re an overall lifestyle, those are just three of the main focuses of the magazine. And even a lot of the wellness content; when you’re highlighting these philanthropic efforts of some of these unfortunate diseases and things some children have; when we support them and we go to these fundraisers and highlight and try to help them create awareness; that is meaningful to us. And that makes it a little bit more real for me that we’re actually making a difference in some of these families’ lives by trying to help. Where some of these magazines never even think of covering a kidney disease or something else, we kind of promote that to really help create awareness and then we go and fully support the event; we back it and do fundraising and that type of thing.

I think a lot of the enjoyment comes from being involved in those types of things and being able to honor those families by just highlighting and helping to create awareness for their situations.

Samir Husni: Is there anything else that you’d like to add?

Daniel Hall: I’d just like to thank our supporters and thank our team. We’re a small crew that does a lot. And really, everything that we do is to just try and put good content to each of those areas and basically don’t stop. Bella is an example of what passion and dedication can do. It’s amazing that we’ve been fortunate enough to be able to get to where we are today, and we plan on keeping going and we truly appreciate everyone involved.

Samir Husni: If I showed up unexpectedly to your home one evening after work, what would I find you doing; reading a magazine, reading on your iPad, watching television, or something else?

Daniel Hall: We have three small children, not so small now; they’re 12, 11 and 7. Being that we work together, we try when we come home to turn it off. And sometimes that’s difficult, because obviously, you’re always thinking of something. What needs to be done? But we really try to focus and get home and then zone in on what’s important at that point. For the most part it would be being with the children, doing something, whether it’s afterschool soccer, or just being home. It’s really family time that we focus on and we try to really pay attention to doing good quality family time and during the day good quality business.

You can catch us doing anything from playing a board game, to sitting and watching a family movie together, and we try to do that. One night is movie night; one night is board game night; sometimes it is just everyone doing their own thing. My wife is a big TV fan, so I may just try and catch something that she has DVR’ed and we’ll watch it together. In the later part of the evening, after the kids have gone to bed, it will be back to work and trying to plan for the next day and week, and back into the thinking process.

Samir Husni: My typical last question; what keeps you up at night?

Daniel Hall: That’s a good question. (Laughs) I have to say that I am a good sleeper, so when it is bedtime, I can typically shut it down and go to sleep. But when I am kept up it’s just all of the activities of what we’re doing. I don’t want to ever take anything for granted. Life is short for all of us, so at night I try to really think of whether or not we accomplished what we wanted to? I think of strategic ways that we can do better to make a bigger impact on people that is going to be meaningful and to help them. We try and make the content more than just fluff. We try to make a difference with the brand when people are reading the pages of Bella and Celebrity Page.

So, if I am kept awake, it’s from thinking about the day and of new ideas about how we can differentiate and better ourselves.

Samir Husni: Thank you.

“While the Internet shows you what’s out there, it’s not what you always see. There are images that look great on the Internet, but once you see them in person, they’re not that hot. So, I think someone spending $25,000 and up for a painting rarely will buy it sight unseen on the Internet, unless it has provenance that it’s to an artist they have already experienced on some more intimate level in person.

“Taking that idea and putting it back to the magazine; it’s like when people look at an artwork, they want to have a tactile experience, so picking up a magazine and looking at it, feeling the weight of the magazine in your hand, the thickness of the paper, the high visual quality of what’s on the page; it kind of creates a world that you can get sucked into. It captures your attention and your emotions, and you can experience it by holding it in your hand, take it home with you and read it at your leisure. It’s just a completely, I think, more rewarding experience than looking at an online magazine.” Steve Martin

Art+Design magazine is a New Orleans-based publication that is spreading its local wings and going global. Something its founder and publisher, Steve Martin, said has been the ultimate goal all along. The magazine is taking on the luxury market and adding a healthy dash of creative artistry to the mix by viewing each and every topic from an artistic lens, an interesting concept that certainly spices things up and changes the niche game entirely.

I spoke with Steve recently and we talked about his “worldly” expectations for Art+Design and also touched on the local insert that will soon start plumping the book with even more goodness of content, his new magazine called Canvas, an idea that came to him as he thought about some local advertisers who might get left behind with the new global slant of the parent publication.

Steve is an artist and a patron saint of the art districts of New Orleans and Miami, having galleries in both for quite some time. Today, he concentrates on his own studio in the Crescent City and his magazines that promise to bring art, fashion, photography, interiors and many other luxury topics to the four corners of the world, all covered in the creative style he knows so well, the artists’ eye. He is a man who is open about his deep and abiding faith in God and his sheer sincerity shines through each and every expression of his work that he shares.

So, I hope that you enjoy this very informative and interesting discussion with an artist and a creator of print that is both an entrepreneur and an experienced publisher in his own right, the Mr. Magazine™ interview with Steve Martin, Founder and Publisher, Art+Design magazine.

But first the sound-bites:

On the history of Art+Design: I started thinking about where people were coming from when it came to my own art and it was the luxury market. And I began to think about luxury lifestyle magazines and how when you look at W Magazine, they have an art editorial in there and it really means something, and there’s Architectural Digest that has an art essay in it, and it really just stands out. I came up with the idea of creating a magazine that encompassed art, design and the experience of that luxury lifestyle and that’s where Art+Design came from.

On why he felt that a print magazine was the best platform for Art+Design: It’s like when people look at an artwork, they want to have a tactile experience, so picking up a magazine and looking at it, feeling the weight of the magazine in your hand, the thickness of the paper, the high visual quality of what’s on the page; it kind of creates a world that you can get sucked into. It captures your attention and your emotions, and you can experience it by holding it in your hand, take it home with you and read it at your leisure. It’s just a completely, I think, more rewarding experience than looking at an online magazine.

On why he decided to go global with the magazine: New Orleans has definitely injected into the world a great number of very influential people: writers, artists and musicians. It’s the birthplace of jazz and there’s quite a bit of culture that has permeated the world from New Orleans. I was thought that New Orleans was on the same level as New York and Paris in its cultural impact. And I really thought it should be elevated and there was nothing in New Orleans that elevated New Orleans or made anyone think of anything that they weren’t already thinking, which was that we were provincial. So, when I started this thing out I wanted it to be an international magazine. It was never meant to just stay local. My long-term vision was to launch it into the international public eye as quickly as possible.

On why he thinks it took so long for someone like himself to come along and realize that the city of New Orleans was deserving of a global magazine that documented the luxury lifestyle in an artistic way: It’s a little bit of that provincial nature that everyone saw from outside New Orleans. They weren’t off; it is provincial in a way. It’s a hip little city and a tight community. It’s done a certain way.

On whether he believes that as long as there is art, there will be print: Yes. I think that the demise of print magazines is premature. I don’t think that the Internet can give the experience that a magazine does. Now, will it kill off the weaker magazines; yes, it’s already done that. You’ve seen the decline in the print market and that’s due to the weaning process that’s heightened by the Internet. I don’t think that you get a chance to hang around if you’re not staying alive by figuring out how to stay alive. You have to be proactive in it. You can’t just create it, then let it coast.

On how he is being proactive with Art+Design: We’re assignment driven, so we get submissions all of the time, but that’s never really worked out for us, so it’s really just keeping our eyes opened and looking at world trends. One of the things that I try to do, and is an interesting direction, I think, is that because New Orleans is that international city; we look for stories that are in the world and either have some thread back to New Orleans, and that can be really thin, or from a story that’s already here and has some effect out in the world.

On the biggest stumbling block he’s had to face and how he overcame it: I guess it was the money because I started with none. I didn’t have a backer; it’s self-sustaining, I guess. The way that I created it was I took a notepad and I laid out 80 pages, hand-drawn in the notepad, and then I went into Vanity Fair, Vogue and Architectural Digest and Art News and tore pages out of those magazines and then created an 80-page, stapled together copy of those stripped out pages and I walked around the city and I showed people my notebook of what I wanted to design and what I wanted the layout of the magazine to be and the concept behind it, and then I showed them the ads and the stories that were in the stripped out pages that I had, and I said this is what I’m shooting for, for my magazine to be of this caliber and quality and this level of publication.
And I basically sold enough ads from that to start it, so the difficulty has been every issue for the first four years now has been hand-to-mouth.

On what kind of art he creates: My website is stevemartinfineart.com and I paint, sculpt and draw. I make prints. I’m self-taught, so I haven’t run into anything that I haven’t tried. (Laughs) I’m always experimenting. Again, I came from a little town and I have always been an artist. I won a competition when I was five years old and I got to go on television for an art piece that I did. And that’s when I decided that I wanted to be an artist. I got all that attention and some candy. And I’ve stayed with it.

On anything else he’d like to add: Art+Design is meant to be the global magazine, I want it to be on par with Vanity Fair, Town & Country, Architectural Digest; all of those magazines. That’s been the goal, to be in that peer group. Now that I have launched into that arena and we’re striving to get there, the local market at some point may get left behind, not in content all the way, but the ability for some of the local advertisers to hang. So, I came up with the idea of Canvas, our new magazine, and the name came from the art side; a blank canvas full of infinite possibilities. And then the other side of the coin is when you move into a new area you canvas the area to see what’s cool and what’s going on. So I took that as the catalyst for Canvas and decided that could be the growth vehicle, a certain level where the main focus would be Art+Design, but we could create an attachable magazine called Canvas Chicago; Canvas New Orleans; Canvas Atlanta; Canvas Miami, and then grow it from there.

On what someone would find him doing if they showed up unexpectedly at his home one evening: Sleeping, because I don’t stop. A few years ago, I sort of started over in my life, and I started the magazine at that same time. And I had a painting studio uptown New Orleans that’s literally a 10×10 room and I moved into that and basically took everything that I could make or create and I would put it into the magazine. So, I still live in that 10×10 room; I don’t need anything else because I just come here and sleep. I’m typically always working. If you want to catch me in the afternoon; I’ll probably be at work and we could have dinner, but when I go home, it’s just to fall into bed exhausted.

On what keeps him up at night: Nothing; I’ve come to a place in my life where, and I think it was in the last publisher’s letter before this, you can see some of the stuff I write a lot about, my experiences. One of the things that I used to do was come up with an idea; work like hell to make it come to pass, and then worry it to death. I’d worry about it all of the time. I have since learned through my faith to change my attitude from worrying about everything to having faith that things will work out. So, I haven’t changed my work ethic, I still come up with a zillion ideas and I still tenaciously work hard at it, but rather than worrying about it all of the time, now I have faith that it will either be or not be and I’m leaving that up to God to decide and then I just keep moving forward.

And now the lightly edited transcript of the Mr. Magazine™ interview with Steve Martin, founder and publisher, Art+Design magazine.

Samir Husni: Congratulations on the national launch of Art+Design. I picked up the magazine recently and loved it.

Steve Martin: Thank you. We’ve been working on it quite a while. We actually, through Curtis Circulation, went global with this issue, so we’re shipping magazines from Iceland, throughout Europe and down into Singapore, Australia and New Zealand, and then Panama, with more countries coming.

Samir Husni: Tell me the story of Art+Design.

Steve Martin: I’m an artist and I have a gallery on Julia Street in New Orleans and have had one there since the 1990s. It has always been a challenge as an artist and a gallery owner to build a sustainable branding campaign through advertising. The cash flow was always so uneven. And it made it difficult to assign contracts to get breaks for advertising in the magazine that we thought would bring buyers to the door.

So, I had always been interested in magazines since I was a kid. I grew up in a little rural town near Alexandria, Louisiana called Tioga. I’d joke around and say the only art they had in the whole town was the calendar that was at the gas station. It was very rural. But somehow in that rural setting I would get my hands on interior design magazines and I was amazed at all of the architecture and interiors that I saw in them. So I started looking at magazines and magazine design, and that was back in the 60s and 70s.

I moved to New Orleans in 1987 and was “discovered” by a gallery owner and I began having one-man shows, building my art career up from there. In the process of my art career, I became the president of the arts district here in New Orleans. And I did that up until Katrina hit. And when I moved to Miami to keep my New Orleans gallery going, I opened up two places and for three years I flew back and forth each month, from New Orleans to Miami. While in Miami, I created an arts district down there called “Miami Art Design and Entertainment District,” which was in what’s now the Design District, and later became Wynwood.

In the process of creating that district, I was trying to figure out a way to advertise the district and what we’d done in New Orleans was to create a walking brochure that basically had a little blurb about each gallery and a map and directory. So, I posed that to the people who became members of that organization down there and we had something that we’d never had in New Orleans, which was money to operate on. We had 110 members and they all put about $2,500, so we had $250,000 of operating cash for the 501(c) (3) to promote ourselves.

The young man that I was working with to create the walking brochure; we sat down and we started thinking about it and he said that this was kind of an opportunity to create something like an airline magazine for our neighborhood, where it’s only shown around in the district and it only writes about the people, the members, who are in the district and it would contain the brochure, but it would have editorial about the galleries and the shops, content that we can basically control. Then all of those people could place their ads around it.

So, we created something called the “Miami Design District Guide.” And it’s still going. The young man that runs it is John White. And he was the publisher; I was just helping with sales and getting the members to come on board.

Then when New Orleans got on its feet and I moved back from Miami, I brought that idea back here and I created a little magazine called “Art New Orleans.” And it was just for the New Orleans arts district. The editorials were about the galleries and artists in the district and advertisers were the art galleries around it. It was very myopic in its vision and it was only about art, therefore subject to the cash flow problems that galleries and artists generally always struggle with. So, it was never really viable; it couldn’t grow. It was a 32-page, saddle stitched magazine and it was promotional in nature. We only wrote about the people who advertised in there, or the district. And it stayed around for seven years; it was just kind of there. But it gave me an opportunity to learn a whole lot about the nature of publishing and what people are looking for and how to work within the industry.

When John White decided that after seven years of not making any money, actually losing money, that he didn’t want to be a part of the New Orleans one anymore, I offered to buy him out and he said no, let’s just let it kind of go away, and I told him that I was going to start another magazine and he said OK, and he went his way and I went mine and it was all on good terms.

I sat for a year thinking about how I wanted to move forward. And what I determined was magazines, basically being myopic in their vision, really got attention from the academic crowd, from other gallery owners and from other artists and teachers. And those were people interested in art and interested in seeing themselves in print and interested in what was going on in the art world. But it didn’t really bring a lot of art buyers in. And that’s what sustains the business.

So, I started thinking about where people were coming from when it came to my own art and it was the luxury market. And I began to think about luxury lifestyle magazines and how when you look at W Magazine, they have an art editorial in there and it really means something, and there’s Architectural Digest that has an art essay in it and it really just stands out.

I came up with the idea of creating a magazine that encompassed art, design and the experience of that luxury lifestyle and that’s where Art+Design came from. It’s a simple name, and because it’s so simple, I guess that’s why it was still there. I started looking for magazine names to name the publication and it seemed like everything that I could think of for a name had already been taken and was a magazine somewhere in the world. Finally it just came down to Art+Design, which is what it is, and that wasn’t taken and it worked, and it said what we were going to do.

So, the whole concept behind the magazine’s vision looked at every aspect of the luxury lifestyle through an artistic lens, and used that as the catalyst to write about whatever we wrote about, so it could be fashion or whatever; it’s an artistic view about fashion. Or if it’s an interior design, it’s an artist’s residence or an artistic view of the residence, because it’s different or it has a great art collection. And I thought that was something that may show up in other magazines, but it isn’t really focused on in other magazines. And that was the catalyst for the nature of what we were going to put out.

Samir Husni: Why did you feel that a printed magazine was the best platform for you to promote the art district and that luxury lifestyle?

Steve Martin: Having experience with art, I know the Internet is a great research engine and it allows you to get out and look around to determine where things are that you might like or what you might like, but it’s not a great vehicle for selling art. You don’t know what you get until you have bought it and received it by mail basically. When you buy a painting, I think it’s a lot more of a tactile experience. You want to walk up to it and look at it; you want to touch it and have that intimate experience of being next to it when you’re thinking about bringing it home and putting it on your wall.

And while the Internet shows you what’s out there, it’s not what you always see. There are images that look great on the Internet, but once you see them in person, they’re not that hot. So, I think someone spending $25,000 and up for a painting rarely will buy it sight unseen on the Internet, unless it has provenance that it’s to an artist they have already experienced on some more intimate level in person.

Taking that idea and putting it back to the magazine; it’s like when people look at an artwork, they want to have a tactile experience, so picking up a magazine and looking at it, feeling the weight of the magazine in your hand, the thickness of the paper, the high visual quality of what’s on the page; it kind of creates a world that you can get sucked into. It captures your attention and your emotions, and you can experience it by holding it in your hand, take it home with you and read it at your leisure. It’s just a completely, I think, more rewarding experience than looking at an online magazine.

Samir Husni: And why did you make the decision to have a magazine that is still based in New Orleans, but now also global?

Steve Martin: I’ve always thought of New Orleans as an international city. And I experienced a little bit of frustration in Miami because it was another international city and I thought the closeness in the culture would make it a really easy transition. I really enjoyed Miami but the perception that people from different parts of the world have of New Orleans is quite different than what people in New Orleans think. We had Katrina going on at that time, and then there was the mayor of New Orleans who was always in the news with something he had done, and most of what people thought of about New Orleans was that it was a great place to visit, very historic, a lot of fun because of Bourbon Street and the French Quarter, but other than that people thought of it as being very provincial.

And being from Louisiana and New Orleans; New Orleans has definitely injected into the world a great number of very influential people: writers, artists and musicians. It’s the birthplace of jazz and there’s quite a bit of culture that has permeated the world from New Orleans. I was thought that New Orleans was on the same level as New York and Paris in its cultural impact. And I really thought it should be elevated and there was nothing in New Orleans that elevated New Orleans or made anyone think of anything that they weren’t already thinking, which was that we were provincial.

So, when I started this thing out I wanted it to be an international magazine. It was never meant to just stay local. My long-term vision was to launch it into the international public eye as quickly as possible.

Samir Husni: In your letter from the publisher you quote Tennessee Williams: the United States has three major cities, New York, Los Angeles and New Orleans. And everywhere else is Cleveland.

Steve Martin: Yes, that was in my publisher’s letter.

Samir Husni: There are plenty of magazines in New Orleans; why do you think it took so long for someone like yourself to come along and recognize what a cultural hub New Orleans is and that it should be made more global than it already is by documenting that globalization?

Steve Martin: It’s a little bit of that provincial nature that everyone saw from outside New Orleans. They weren’t off; it is provincial in a way. It’s a hip little city and a tight community. It’s done a certain way.

One of the things that I run into a lot is there are some advertisers here that aren’t global, but could be global advertisers. And I’ve approached them with the magazine and they’re not interested in advertising because we’re not a social magazine. All of the other magazines in New Orleans pretty much are social. There are pictures of who’s who, where they work, and the party, who they were with and so on. And that’s the local attitude. I don’t think they thought they could be more than what they were. They’ve been like they have for so long and that’s all that has mattered. New Orleans is somewhat isolated in its business culture; people do a lot of business out of New Orleans in different places, but it’s kind of closely-held here. I guess. And I don’t think they’ve dared to have the vision to see themselves in that arena somehow.

And there was really nothing else out there for them to do, it was kind of just what was available, I guess. I haven’t seen anything like that available to them in the 20 years that I’ve been here, a magazine that would not be just locally oriented.

Samir Husni: As an artist, do you believe that as long as there’s art, there will be print?

Steve Martin: Yes. I think that the demise of print magazines is premature. I don’t think that the Internet can give the experience that a magazine does. Now, will it kill off the weaker magazines; yes, it’s already done that. You’ve seen the decline in the print market and that’s due to the weaning process that’s heightened by the Internet. I don’t think that you get a chance to hang around if you’re not staying alive by figuring out how to stay alive. You have to be proactive in it. You can’t just create it, then let it coast.

Samir Husni: How do you do that? How are you being creative and not just letting it coast? How are you being proactive with Art+Design?

Steve Martin: We’re assignment driven, so we get submissions all of the time, but that’s never really worked out for us, so it’s really just keeping our eyes opened and looking at world trends. One of the things that I try to do, and is an interesting direction, I think, is that because New Orleans is that international city; we look for stories that are in the world and either have some thread back to New Orleans, and that can be really thin, or from a story that’s already here and has some effect out in the world.

We just try and keep our ears to the ground and really look for interesting things to write about because we want our editorial to be strong. It’s not a pay-to-play magazine, so we have a wall of separation between the editorials and the advertising, which is another thing that New Orleans is kind of bad about. It’s like all of the advertising here drives the editorial in most of the magazines. Not all of it, but a lot of it; a good portion of it.

In my experience with Art New Orleans, which was a little art promotional magazine that I did, it was all promotional and one of the comments that we received was, after a while people realized that you were only written about if you paid for it, and so it lost some of its impact. So, we made a decision to, with the creation of this magazine, or I made a decision, to keep that completely separate. You cannot buy an ad and get an article. It has to stand on its own legs. We don’t punish you if you’re an advertiser with a good story, we’ll write about it. But the key is it has to be a good story.

So with that said we look for good interesting stories. We’re not investigative journalism, it’s a lot of feel-good stuff; it’s not pie-in-the-sky stuff, we just like to write entertaining stories with witty and pithy commentary and points-of-view that people will enjoy reading. If you have a strong, visual content with no story behind it, it’s going to be just fluff, so we put in what we think are strong readable stories and then try to amaze everybody with the visual content, which is the art side of it.

Samir Husni: What has been the biggest stumbling block that you’ve had to face and how did you overcome it?

Steve Martin: I guess it was the money because I started with none. I didn’t have a backer; it’s self-sustaining, I guess. The way that I created it was I took a notepad and I laid out 80 pages, hand-drawn in the notepad, and then I went into Vanity Fair, Vogue and Architectural Digest and Art News and tore pages out of those magazines and then created an 80-page, stapled together copy of those stripped out pages and I walked around the city and I showed people my notebook of what I wanted to design and what I wanted the layout of the magazine to be and the concept behind it, and then I showed them the ads and the stories that were in the stripped out pages that I had, and I said this is what I’m shooting for, for my magazine to be of this caliber and quality and this level of publication.

And I basically sold enough ads from that to start it, so the difficulty has been every issue for the first four years now has been hand-to-mouth. There hasn’t been a cash cushion, so that makes things pretty nerve-wracking from time to time. And it’s based on what we sell in ads as to how thick the magazine is going to be and we’ve been blessed by people getting onboard and staying with us.

Samir Husni: You mentioned that you’re an artist, so do you paint or sculpt; what type of art do you create?

Steve Martin: My website is stevemartinfineart.com and I paint, sculpt and draw. I make prints. I’m self-taught, so I haven’t run into anything that I haven’t tried. (Laughs) I’m always experimenting. Again, I came from a little town and I have always been an artist. I won a competition when I was five years old and I got to go on television for an art piece that I did. And that’s when I decided that I wanted to be an artist. I got all that attention and some candy. And I’ve stayed with it.

My father was a contractor, a practical man who taught me business and the values of hard work and determination. A lot of what I’ve done is that I haven’t known any better. I didn’t know that I couldn’t do something, so I just tried it and was determined to make it work.

Samir Husni: Is there anything else you’d like to add?

Steve Martin: Art+Design is meant to be the global magazine, I want it to be on par with Vanity Fair, Town & Country, Architectural Digest; all of those magazines. That’s been the goal, to be in that peer group. Now that I have launched into that arena and we’re striving to get there, the local market at some point may get left behind, not in content all the way, but the ability for some of the local advertisers to hang.

So, I thought about how I wanted to expand this thing, what model I wanted to follow. One of the models that I looked at was modern luxury magazines and they have the different city magazines, such as Houston, C.S., and D.C. They have 26 labels. A certain percentage of each magazine is national content, similar across the board, and then depending on the local sales team’s ability, another percentage is for that city. And I thought that was one growth model, but it seemed cumbersome for what I had to work with here.

So, I came up with the idea of Canvas, our new magazine, and the name came from the art side; a blank canvas full of infinite possibilities. And then the other side of the coin is when you move into a new area you canvas the area to see what’s cool and what’s going on. So I took that as the catalyst for Canvas and decided that could be the growth vehicle, a certain level where the main focus would be Art+Design, but we could create an attachable magazine called Canvas Chicago; Canvas New Orleans; Canvas Atlanta; Canvas Miami, and then grow it from there.

That was the thinking, how to bring local promotional content into magazine without compromising the integrity of the magazine. And I came up with creating a separate magazine that goes along with it where you could write profiles and you could put in advertorials and do things that were a little bit more local-based. I jokingly say that it’s going to be a cross between Scout Guide and Where Magazine.

Samir Husni: If I showed up unexpectedly to your home one evening after work, what would I find you doing; reading a magazine, reading your iPad, watching television, painting, or something else?

Steve Martin: Sleeping, because I don’t stop. A few years ago, I sort of started over in my life, and I started the magazine at that same time. And I had a painting studio uptown New Orleans that’s literally a 10×10 room and I moved into that and basically took everything that I could make or create and I would put it into the magazine. So, I still live in that 10×10 room; I don’t need anything else because I just come here and sleep. I’m typically always working. If you want to catch me in the afternoon; I’ll probably be at work and we could have dinner, but when I go home, it’s just to fall into bed exhausted.

Samir Husni: My typical last question; what keeps you up at night?

Steve Martin: Nothing; I’ve come to a place in my life where, and I think it was in the last publisher’s letter before this, you can see some of the stuff I write a lot about, my experiences. One of the things that I used to do was come up with an idea; work like hell to make it come to pass, and then worry it to death. I’d worry about it all of the time.

I have since learned through my faith to change my attitude from worrying about everything to having faith that things will work out. So, I haven’t changed my work ethic, I still come up with a zillion ideas and I still tenaciously work hard at it, but rather than worrying about it all of the time, now I have faith that it will either be or not be and I’m leaving that up to God to decide and then I just keep moving forward. If something fails, it’s a learning experience that I can incorporate into the next thing. I’ve had enough successes and failures in life to know that it’s life and mountains and valleys come and you never know where they’re going to be, you just have to have your head on right so that you can get through whatever. If you’re at the top of the mountain, don’t let it give you the big head, and if you’re in the valley, don’t despair.

Samir Husni: Thank you.

“I think in Mexico it would be very difficult to exist without a print edition for a magazine, mainly because much of Latin America is still a very tactile society. Credibility really depends on being able to show something, so being taken seriously by advertisers, by media partners, by writers, does require a print version.” Kenneth Isom Barnes

 Accepting an invitation to experience Mexico with a friend who lives there is not the most typical of ways to start two magazines in another country; in fact, some might call it atypical. And in some cases, complete craziness. But to those passionate dreamers and risk takers we all know as entrepreneurs, it’s just another day inside their heads.

Kenneth Barnes is one young man whose motto of “make life beautiful wherever you are” would probably be one of the biggest catalysts that caused him to stay in Mexico after that initial visit and launch two gorgeous food magazines. And living with regrets should he not have followed his heart would probably be the other propeller that carried him straight into his seeming destiny.

I spoke with Kenneth recently and we talked about his early life and then his eventual magazine life. He’s a man who has known responsibility, having cared for his grandmother until her death when both of his parents died within weeks of each other. And he’s a man who believes in taking chances and then working hard to make the most of any opportunities that might come his way.

With Food Mexico and Me and Food Acapulco, he’s achieved what some might call two impossibilities, having seen quite a bit of success with the two magazines in just a little over three years. Just goes to show that with hard work and a passionate spirit about what you’re doing, a person can capture their dreams and run with them. Or in Kenneth’s case; stay put with them and build them into a Mexican brand.

I hope that you enjoy this inspirational story of a man who believes you can make your life beautiful and successful no matter your environment, even if you’re carving your niche in unfamiliar surroundings. And now the Mr. Magazine™ interview with Kenneth Barnes, Executive Editor, Food Mexico and Me and Food Acapulco.

But first the sound-bites:

On why he’s thinks the environment in Mexico is much more open to new magazines and ideas than the United States: I think that magazines are still important in Mexico and print media is also very important here. The United States has a lot more digital media than Mexico. But the Mexican media tends to be more flexible in that there are more opportunities to enter and even though there are some very large companies that are in the magazine business, smaller players do have a place to enter into the business.

 

On what gave him the idea to go to Mexico and launch his magazines: It’s sort of a complex story. I was in my 20s and both of my parents died 13 days apart and I became the sole caregiver for my grandmother. A few years later she died and a friend of mine who was Mexican and was going back to Mexico to spend time with his family suggested that I come with him and visit Mexico. So, when I went to Mexico, I eventually got my Visa and a job. And after a few years in late 2012, I was thinking that maybe I should choose a new city to live in. I lived in Acapulco, which is a very challenging city right now, and it came to me that if I don’t make where I am beautiful, I can go all over the world and I’ll have the same troubles after six months or a year. So, I decided one way that I could do that was to do something constructive. And that’s when I came up with the idea of Food Acapulco, merging the idea of the international culinary assets, local culinary assets, and some interviews, in a print format. And it was picked up by Wal-Mart within the local region and it sold extraordinarily well.

 

On his next magazine launch, Food Mexico and Me in both English and Spanish: Yes, it was launched in English and Spanish. We got the contract to test market our magazine in Manhattan, so that’s why we did an English version of it as well.

 

On the positive and negative things he’s learned from his Mexican experience launching magazines: On the positive side I’ve learned that in Mexico people will at least listen to you, they will at least hear you out, which is something that you don’t really have in the United States. Try to get a deal with CBS or Comcast and it would be nearly impossible, where in Mexico, whether it’s a large advertiser or a distributor or retailers; you can be heard. As far as the negatives, I think that the negatives in Mexico are very similar to other countries in that print is a challenging market because there is so many other media formats, in particular the Internet.

 

On whether he thinks he could exist without the print component of his brand: I think in Mexico it would be very difficult to exist without a print edition for a magazine, mainly because much of Latin America is still a very tactile society. Credibility really depends on being able to show something, so being taken seriously by advertisers, by media partners, by writers, does require a print version.

 

On whether he’s had any backlash from the Mexican audience since he’s a United States citizen basically telling them how to cook and eat their own food: No, absolutely no backlash. In fact, there has only been a very welcoming environment. You have to remember that a lot of Mexican media already is dominated by foreign corporations. For example, Mexicans love Hollywood movies.

 

On the magazines’ future: The future for the magazine is that I want to increase the frequency as well as increase the way that we reach out to consumers. The Mexican media market is becoming more fractured over time, so we’re using our magazines as a way to build our initial brand and our initial business.

 

On any upcoming plans for the brand: We’re consistently talking to partners about helping us to launch new magazines, to sponsor new advertising in our magazines, to do promotional projects outside of the traditional print realm.

 

On anything else that he’d like to add: Mexico is a very aspirational market. Many people are really seeking to improve themselves and improve themselves many times by the items that they consume. That means that you have to advertise in the market to a Mexican consumer in a slightly different way than you would to an American, German or a Japanese consumer, which are countries where people have traditionally for generations more wealth.

 

On what someone would find him doing if they showed up unexpectedly one evening at his home: Usually what I do is a lot of research about Mexican society and culture. Though not so much as what has been told, but the subtext. That helps me a lot in trying to craft messages for our magazine and in finding new opportunities which maybe larger companies in Mexico that print magazines aren’t looking at.

 

On what motivates him to get out of bed in the morning: What drives me is that Mexico is an open market where there are many large companies that dominate the industry, but very few startups. So, because of that it gives you an open field to reach out to all types of sources that may have never been reached out to before. Having that chance of being more or less an explorer, I find interesting.

 

On whether he has any plans to return to the United States: I would definitely consider coming back to the States in the future, but for the foreseeable future I’m going to be focusing on the Mexican media, whether it’s print or other media formats. But I have a lot of love for the United States and I have a lot of interest in American media as well; I’ll just see how things work out.

 

On what keeps him up at night: What keeps me up at night is just the idea or worry that I might miss an opportunity on any given day and then how am I going to make an opportunity for tomorrow?

 

And now the lightly edited transcript of the Mr. Magazine™ interview with Kenneth Barnes, Executive Editor, Food Acapulco & Food Mexico and Me.

Samir Husni: You have experience in the U.S. with media, but you’ve said that the environment in the United States was less flexible and open for new magazines or magazine ideas than in Mexico. Why do you think that it’s easier to publish in Mexico than here in the States?

Kenneth Barnes: I think that magazines are still important in Mexico and print media is also very important here. The United States has a lot more digital media than Mexico.

 

But the Mexican media tends to be more flexible in that there are more opportunities to enter and even though there are some very large companies that are in the magazine business, smaller players do have a place to enter into the business.

Now, granted, it depends on the genre. Are you a celebrity magazine; a history magazine; a food magazine, and so on, but we’ve found in the food space it’s been very open and welcoming. And I know from my friends and colleagues that starting magazines in the U.S. can be quite challenging.

Samir Husni: Where are you originally from?

Kenneth Barnes: I grew up for most of my life in North Carolina, but lived a few other places as well. I also went to Duke University there as well.

Samir Husni: What gave you the idea to go to Mexico and launch your magazines?

Kenneth Barnes: It’s sort of a complex story. I was in my 20s and both of my parents died 13 days apart and I became the sole caregiver for my grandmother. A few years later she died and a friend of mine who was Mexican and was going back to Mexico to spend time with his family suggested that I come with him and visit Mexico.

And eventually when I told my other friends and family about that; I thought they would tell me that I was being crazy for even considering it, but everyone encouraged me to go. So, when I went to Mexico, I eventually got my Visa and a job.

And after a few years in late 2012, I was thinking that maybe I should choose a new city to live in. I lived in Acapulco, which is a very challenging city right now, and it came to me that if I don’t make where I am beautiful, I can go all over the world and I’ll have the same troubles after six months or a year.

So, I decided one way that I could do that was to do something constructive. And that’s when I came up with the idea of Food Acapulco, merging the idea of the international culinary assets, local culinary assets, and some interviews, in a print format. And it was picked up by Wal-Mart within the local region and it sold extraordinarily well.

After that, we were able to, with our second issue; place it in Sanborns, which is where the dominant retail companies sell books and magazines in Mexico. And then this past December we made a deal with Televisa, which owns the largest magazine distributors here in Mexico, and they’ve been great to work with.

It’s been a progression in my experience, and I sort of fell into the magazine projects more so than starting out with a particular plan to move to Mexico and make a magazine. It was more of a personal journey of being constructive and productive wherever I was in the world.

Samir Husni: After Food Acapulco, you launched Food Mexico and Me, both in Spanish and English.

Kenneth Barnes: Yes, it was launched in English and Spanish. We got the contract to test market our magazine in Manhattan, so that’s why we did an English version of it as well.

Samir Husni: And are you still doing Food Acapulco or just Food Mexico and Me?

Kenneth Barnes: We’re primarily doing Food Mexico and Me, but we do have a new issue of Food Acapulco coming out later this year.

Samir Husni: You’ve been doing this for over three years now; how would you evaluate your experience? Would you encourage more people to come from the States to Mexico to launch a magazine? What lessons have you learned, both positive and negative?

Kenneth Barnes: On the positive side I’ve learned that in Mexico people will at least listen to you, they will at least hear you out, which is something that you don’t really have in the United States. Try to get a deal with CBS or Comcast and it would be nearly impossible, where in Mexico, whether it’s a large advertiser or a distributor or retailers; you can be heard. And that doesn’t always mean there’s a positive conclusion, but what it does mean is that you have a chance to at least have an audience, which may lead to something.

I think that’s the biggest positive that I find in the Mexican market, as well as a general sense of people being flexible to new ideas. So, there is no road block to people saying we’ve been doing this for 50 years; we’re not going to change, which sometimes happens in other countries.

As far as the negatives, I think that the negatives in Mexico are very similar to other countries in that print is a challenging market because there is so many other media formats, in particular the Internet. I think there’s also a tendency in the Mexican market to be more television-dominant than print-dominant, so that also becomes a challenge as well.

Samir Husni: When you look at the print magazines and when you look at Food Mexico and Me, and Food Acapulco, what’s unique about the print edition and do you think that you could exist without the print component?

Kenneth Barnes: I think in Mexico it would be very difficult to exist without a print edition for a magazine, mainly because much of Latin America is still a very tactile society. Credibility really depends on being able to show something, so being taken seriously by advertisers, by media partners, by writers, does require a print version.

I think what also makes our print version unique is that there are ways that we can exhibit content to a Mexican audience that’s unique to print and that doesn’t always translate well into the digital format. The Mexican audience can be quite sophisticated, those people who buy magazines, so you can really go on a much more in depth level than the typical “30 Ways to Lose Weight in 30 Days” type thing.

 Samir Husni: Have you had any backlash from your Mexican audience, considering it’s a United States citizen telling them how to cook and eat their own food?

Kenneth Barnes: No, absolutely no backlash. In fact, there has only been a very welcoming environment. You have to remember that a lot of Mexican media already is dominated by foreign corporations. For example, Mexicans love Hollywood movies.

In my particular case, we do a lot of international food, as well as Mexican food, and I think what has helped me was my first year in Acapulco I lived with a Mexican family. So, I was able to deeply understand the psyche of Mexicans and what they find acceptable and unacceptable. And in general, Mexicans are warm and pleasant people and they’re open to new ideas and new concepts. This isn’t a society where people will just shun something because it’s different.

Samir Husni: Where are you living now, Mexico City?

Kenneth Barnes: Yes, in Mexico City.

Samir Husni: What’s the future for you? Are you going to increase the frequency of those magazines; are you making a living from those magazines; or do you still feel as though you’re a tourist there?

Kenneth Barnes: I think in Mexico you always feel like a tourist at times. The future for the magazine is that I want to increase the frequency as well as increase the way that we reach out to consumers. The Mexican media market is becoming more fractured over time, so we’re using our magazines as a way to build our initial brand and our initial business.

And then go forward into areas of increasing our social media outreach, our audience outreach, our online outreach, as well as branching out into new mediums, such as television, films, radio; just the many ways that we can reach a larger segment of the Mexican population that don’t always have the time to read a magazine.

As far as income, the magazine has generated income, but definitely not enough that I would say that I have “arrived.” It’s an ongoing process, but we have a lot of positive things coming up in the future, which I’m optimistic about.

Samir Husni: Such as?

Kenneth Barnes: We’re consistently talking to partners about helping us to launch new magazines, to sponsor new advertising in our magazines, to do promotional projects outside of the traditional print realm.

We also have plans to eventually do something in video here in Mexico, relating to recipes, food culture, things of that nature. But that’s really been my direction. I’ve received enough positive feedback, both from a financial and market standpoint, it has led me to continue the process for three years and to be optimistic for the future.

Samir Husni: Is there anything else that you’d like to add?

Kenneth Barnes: There are two things that I’d like to say. First, that Mexico is a very aspirational market. Many people are really seeking to improve themselves and improve themselves many times by the items that they consume. That means that you have to advertise in the market to a Mexican consumer in a slightly different way than you would to an American, German or a Japanese consumer, which are countries where people have traditionally for generations more wealth.

The second thing that I would say is that the Mexican consumer’s mind isn’t always transparent, it can be opaque, so what people may say they want and what they actually want can be different. So it’s important to have really good people on the ground to help you navigate the marketplace. In my case, I have a really great team of people who help me, both Mexicans and internationals here in the country. And that helps us not only do market research, but to get all of the paperwork required to get our magazines done, find great partners, advertisers and distributors. Those are the two things that I’d like to add.

Samir Husni: If I showed up unexpectedly one evening at your home, what would I find you doing; reading a magazine, reading on your iPad, watching television, or something else?

Kenneth Barnes: Usually what I do is a lot of research about Mexican society and culture. Though not so much as what has been told, but the subtext. That helps me a lot in trying to craft messages for our magazine and in finding new opportunities which maybe larger companies in Mexico that print magazines aren’t looking at. That’s what I spend a lot of my time doing.

Samir Husni: What motivates you to get out of bed in the morning?

Kenneth Barnes: What drives me is that Mexico is an open market where there are many large companies that dominate the industry, but very few startups. So, because of that it gives you an open field to reach out to all types of sources that may have never been reached out to before. Having that chance of being more or less an explorer, I find interesting.

Samir Husni: Any plan to come back to the United States or Mexico is home now?

Kenneth Barnes: I would definitely consider coming back to the States in the future, but for the foreseeable future I’m going to be focusing on the Mexican media, whether it’s print or other media formats. But I have a lot of love for the United States and I have a lot of interest in American media as well; I’ll just see how things work out.

Samir Husni: My typical last question; what keeps you up at night?

Kenneth Barnes: In life, like my original point that I made earlier; you have to make life beautiful wherever you live. I don’t want to miss out on opportunities. I think that so many times in life we miss great opportunities to improve ourselves or the ones around us. And I don’t want to be that person who says I should have, I could have.

I started a magazine in Mexico, which may have been a kind of strange thing to do for someone who just came to the country to stay for a few months and then gets a job and starts a magazine, but I’m glad that I did it, instead of waiting and wondering my whole life if I should have.

And now that I’ve tried to make my life more beautiful where I am, I see that there are people who walk with you and help you along the way. So, it’s not as lonely or scary as you might think, if you’ll just start and make a five-year plan.

What keeps me up at night is just the idea or worry that I might miss an opportunity on any given day and then how am I going to make an opportunity for tomorrow?

 Samir Husni: Thank you.

 

 

“When I saw my own kids and how they engage with magazines and books; they love print. They love going to the library; they love touching and they’re very tactile. Kids will read a magazine in the back of a car; they love the brightness of it and they love getting mail. Kids today love getting something in the mailbox that is for them. That’s such an enjoyable experience. It’s not an experience you can have by downloading something on a phone or looking at a tablet or other Smart devices.” Janine Boldrin (on why she chose print for the magazine)

“And they (kids) tell us. They love how bright it is and they love the feel of it. We think a lot about the feel of our magazine. When they touch it, they love the quality of the pages. And that’s what kids like and engage with. So, we’ve found that a print experience is perfect for what we’re trying to do.” Janine Boldrin

Military Kids’ Life magazine is the only print title for kids of U.S. service members of all branches that gives voice to the experiences these children have from their parents serving our country. Launched in April 2015 it incorporates military kids as reporters, allowing them the opportunity to tell their stories in their own way and connecting them with a host of people who provide a backdrop of different topics in which they can showcase their talents.

Janine Boldrin is the creative director of the magazine and also a military spouse, her husband being active duty Army. Janine is a woman who knows the excitement and the angst of military life, and the joy of being a writer and a journalist. Her thrill is in the passion she has for her product and the kids who make her smile every day.

I spoke with Janine recently and we talked about the magazine and the diverse emotions military life brings to the families. But no matter the mixed emotions adults and children alike might feel when either being deployed or watching a parent leave for months on end, the magazine presents a positive and bright outlook on the service environment and offers essays, articles, fiction, fun activities and poems, all centered on the concept of finding the bright side of life as a military kid.

The tagline for the magazine is “Find Your Adventure,” so, I invite you to sit back, smile and enjoy the military adventure of a lifetime as you experience a Military Kids’ Life – the Mr. Magazine™ interview with Janine Boldrin, Creative Director, Military Kids’ Life Magazine.

But first the sound-bites:

On the reason behind the company name Chameleon Kids: Chameleon Kids is all about our military kids, the children of U.S. service members, all branches. The reason that we named it Chameleon Kids is because our military kids go into communities and while they have to blend with the communities they move into, they’re also very distinct. So, we chose the word chameleon because we felt it really represented what our military kids have to be like.

On whether she has found her own adventure in the pages of the magazine: It’s 110% my adventure. (Laughs) I love it. It’s amazing the emails that I receive from kids. I have three kids of my own and they’re really why I wanted to do this. I had not worked within the kid’s space with writing, so it was very unfamiliar to me. I wasn’t quite sure what I was going to get, but when I get stories from kids, I am encouraged as an adult every single day.

On the “Hit the Road” section of the magazine: Our reporters are doing content for our print magazine, but they’re also developing some online content for us. For instance, we did a section in our most recent issue on the USO and we sent four military kid reporters out to visit some USOs across the United States. And they had designated times that they needed to go; they had representatives that they were meeting with to interview, and it really gave them a unique experience. They learned communication skills, how to tell a story, how to be responsible and it’s just a great opportunity for them.

On why she decided to launch a print magazine: When I saw my own kids and how they engage with magazines and books; they love print. They love going to the library; they love touching and they’re very tactile. Kids will read a magazine in the back of a car; they love the brightness of it and they love getting mail. Kids today love getting something in the mailbox that is for them. That’s such an enjoyable experience. It’s not an experience you can have by downloading something on a phone or looking at a tablet or other Smart devices.

On how she’s carrying it from the love and passion stage to a business model: That’s a very good point. You can have a passion for something, but it doesn’t necessarily mean that everybody else will have that same passion for your product. And we were worried about that at the beginning because we weren’t sure where this was going to go. But what we have found is that we’ve created something that people didn’t realize they needed, and in doing that we have found a home for our magazine in schools, libraries and in non-profits that serve military families.

On the biggest stumbling block she’s had to face: I think part of it was just not pushing hard enough in the beginning. I feel like we started out really slowly. And we focused on things that weren’t important. For instance, we really thought we needed to have an awesome website right from the get-go. So, we put way too much time and way too much energy in creating this website, instead of really focusing on getting the product out the door. That was one of our primary fails in the beginning.

On the most pleasant moment she’s had on this journey: It’s the kids, every single time. Their emails are just wonderful. I just love the kids’ feedback. They’re brutally honest. They will be the best critic on the face of the earth. They do not filter their comments like adults do. If they don’t like something, they’ll tell you they don’t like it. (Laughs) And if they love something, they’ll have a very genuine expression about it.

On anything else that she’d like to add: I just hope that we’re able to connect more with schools and libraries and that more know that we exist. Quite frequently older military kids will tell us that they really wish this magazine had been around when they were kids. It’s really just hoping that we can reach more people to let them know we exist.

On what motivates her to get out of bed in the morning: When I was a kid I wanted to be a journalist. I’ve wanted to be a writer since day one. I took a very long and winding path to get there, including getting master’s degree in manufacturing and working for IBM. One day I managed to get back to what was truly my original calling. And what gets me out of bed is providing encouragement and opportunities to kids who also feel that, so that they don’t go down a winding path, but they see a more direct way out to what they truly see as their passion and growing their passion, because I would have loved that.

On what keeps her up at night: You know, military life isn’t easy; it really isn’t. My husband is gone from us more than he’s been at home and when you have three kids it’s a huge balance in making sure that everyone’s emotional needs are being met, when you’re the only parent around and your spouse is in a job that puts them in harm’s way. We’re in a society that is very disconnected from that. They don’t understand the sacrifice, truly that is made by military families and the sacrifices that our kids make. And that keeps me up at night.

And now the lightly edited transcript of the Mr. Magazine™ interview with Janine Boldrin, Creative Director, Military Kids’ Life Magazine.

Samir Husni: Tell me the mission, the idea behind Military Kids’ Life and behind the company name, Chameleon Kids.

Janine Boldrin: Chameleon Kids is all about our military kids, the children of U.S. service members, all branches. The reason that we named it Chameleon Kids is because our military kids go into communities and while they have to blend with the communities they move into, they’re also very distinct. So, we chose the word chameleon because we felt it really represented what our military kids have to be like. They have to be a part of their community, but they’re also very vibrant and interesting. And that’s why we chose that name.

We also tried to avoid always using military terms with our kids because military kids are kids too and quite frequently you’ll see anything directed toward the military community using a word like operation kids, or operation this or that, or camouflage. So, we tried not to be too much military, because they really do just like to do fun things also.

The magazine was really born out of me being a writer for the past ten years within the military space. I had written a lot about military families, about veterans and service members, and I really found that there was a void when it came to our military kids. They didn’t have anything that represented their voices. As I started looking at it and researching, I realized that everything that I found out there really focused on the act of moving and most of the time the imagery was pretty sad. It would be a military kid crying or waving goodbye to a parent.

When I looked around at my peers, because we’re an army family, I saw kids that were just being kids and they really had an exciting life because many of them lived overseas, they moved a lot and had amazing experiences. I wanted to give them an opportunity to share that with each other, so that they could become encouraged about military life, rather than just hear this message all of the time that they were broken because their parents were being deployed and they would have too many challenges and have to struggle, and that moving was a bad thing. So, I wanted them to share their stories with each other.

And when they did that, I found that they had a great respect for each other. So, that’s really why we launched the magazine. We did a prototype and tried to figure out if it would work and if it was what they wanted and we found out that it was. We’ve had an exciting journey since.

Samir Husni: To borrow from your tagline “Find Your Adventure,” have you found your adventure; is this your adventure now?

Janine Boldrin: It’s 110% my adventure. (Laughs)

Samir Husni: (Laughs too).

Janine Boldrin: I love it. It’s amazing the emails that I receive from kids. I have three kids of my own and they’re really why I wanted to do this. I had not worked within the kid’s space with writing, so it was very unfamiliar to me. I wasn’t quite sure what I was going to get, but when I get stories from kids, I am encouraged as an adult every single day.

Recently we started sending military kids out to do reporting in the field and it’s been so much fun. They go to concerts and museums; they meet with representatives of the museums and then they write a story for us. And they write to me just to say thank you. They thank me for giving them this experience and for trusting that they could do it. And it really is an adventure. It’s so much fun.

Samir Husni: And you’re talking about the “Hit the Road” section of the magazine; the road trips that the kids are making?

Janine Boldrin: Our reporters are doing content for our print magazine, but they’re also developing some online content for us. For instance, we did a section in our most recent issue on the USO and we sent four military kid reporters out to visit some USOs across the United States. And they had designated times that they needed to go; they had representatives that they were meeting with to interview, and it really gave them a unique experience. They learned communication skills, how to tell a story, how to be responsible and it’s just a great opportunity for them. So, that’s what we’re doing with our reporters; we’re trying to get them out, more than just doing things over the phone, so that they can write about their own experiences.

Samir Husni: We live in a digital age, there’s no question about it. And some people say that kids don’t read anymore; so why did you decide to launch a print magazine?

Janine Boldrin: That is an excellent question because we have been asked that since the beginning. We don’t get that question so much anymore, but when we launched the magazine everybody said we had to be out of our minds because kids would not engage with it if it’s not online content.

When I saw my own kids and how they engage with magazines and books; they love print. They love going to the library; they love touching and they’re very tactile. Kids will read a magazine in the back of a car; they love the brightness of it and they love getting mail. Kids today love getting something in the mailbox that is for them. That’s such an enjoyable experience. It’s not an experience you can have by downloading something on a phone or looking at a tablet or other Smart devices.

People get their mail every single day and when a magazine shows up with the child’s name on it, it’s exciting for that child. And then they can go up in a tree with it, they don’t have to worry about glare. They can sit on the playground with it, and that’s where we see our kids’ reading magazines.

And they tell us. They love how bright it is and they love the feel of it. We think a lot about the feel of our magazine. When they touch it, they love the quality of the pages. And that’s what kids like and engage with. So, we’ve found that a print experience is perfect for what we’re trying to do.

Samir Husni: I can hear the passion in your voice and the love you have for this project. How are you taking it from mere passion and love to a business model?

Janine Boldrin: Exactly. That’s a very good point. You can have a passion for something, but it doesn’t necessarily mean that everybody else will have that same passion for your product. And we were worried about that at the beginning because we weren’t sure where this was going to go. But what we have found is that we’ve created something that people didn’t realize they needed, and in doing that we have found a home for our magazine in schools, libraries and in non-profits that serve military families. We have a lot of military personnel stationed overseas that order individual subscriptions. We’re working with overseas schools that serve military kids to get our magazine into their schools.

What we’ve found is that it really serves as a springboard for conversation for military kids in group settings. We’ve also developed an educator’s guide that goes along with every issue so that teachers know how to use the magazine in their classrooms and in their small groups. It can help in starting conversations with military kids about their experiences.

Something that is secondary to our primary audience is that we’ve found that adults who interact with military kids are reading our magazine, because they want to learn what the military kid experience is so they can serve them better. We’re finding that teachers, parents; again, non-profits that serve military kids, they want to be reading it, so that they understand what our kids are experiencing. And that’s how we’ve grown our business.

It started with us thinking about individual subscribers, but now we’re getting subscriptions from schools. Our magazines are going to select USO centers and one of those is in airports where kids and parents will sit down in for periods of time between flights. And as you well know, airports are a place where people pick up magazines. We’ve found a lot of different homes that we didn’t expect to find and we’re finding more every day.

Samir Husni: You’ve launched the magazine and you’re now on issue #6; what has been the biggest stumbling block that you’ve faced during all of this and how did you overcome it?

Janine Boldrin: I think part of it was just not pushing hard enough in the beginning. I feel like we started out really slowly. And we focused on things that weren’t important. For instance, we really thought we needed to have an awesome website right from the get-go. So, we put way too much time and way too much energy in creating this website, instead of really focusing on getting the product out the door. That was one of our primary fails in the beginning.

I will say that we sped up after that play. Once we got past that and put our first prototype out, then I started realizing and my business partner Amy, who’s also another military spouse, also realized that it was really more about just getting the product out there and it didn’t need to be perfect. We’re perfectionists, her and I. But we realized the magazine didn’t need to be perfect in the beginning and now as we get it out and it’s getting where we want it to be, we see it as more of an evolution than perfect from the start.

Samir Husni: What was the most pleasant moment for you on this journey?

Janine Boldrin: It’s the kids, every single time. Their emails are just wonderful. I always keep a copy of the magazine in the backseat of my car because my kids will be doing something and I’d much rather have them reading the magazine than playing some electronic device. And I love to hear them comment about something they read.

I just love the kids’ feedback. They’re brutally honest. They will be the best critic on the face of the earth. They do not filter their comments like adults do. If they don’t like something, they’ll tell you they don’t like it. (Laughs) And if they love something, they’ll have a very genuine expression about it. So, I love hearing those comments from my kids in the backseat or one that has emailed me.

Recently I was at the pool with friends that I have known for quite some time. Their daughter had written something in school weeks ago and had said to her mom that they had to bring it to me. So, her mom had packed it into the pool bag and her daughter gave it to me at the pool and said, “Ms. Janine, can you please read my essay? I really want you to read this.” And it was all about her father’s deployment. I sat down and read it and it was just so genuine about her feelings as she was going through this experience. And I felt so trusted with her story and all of these kids’ stories. It takes a lot of trust to put your story out into the world.

So, it’s them, the kids. It’s them bringing me what they want to share with their peers and the world. And that’s what’s really exciting about it.

Samir Husni: Is there anything else that you’d like to add?

Janine Boldrin: I just hope that we’re able to connect more with schools and libraries and that more know that we exist. Quite frequently older military kids will tell us that they really wish this magazine had been around when they were kids. It’s really just hoping that we can reach more people to let them know we exist. And we’re always happy to send a complimentary copy because we find that once people see it and experience it, they understand it. And they get excited about it too.

And I’m also really excited about our reporters. We have about eight reporters in D.C. and we have a database of around 30 kid reporters across the United States. And we’re connecting them with opportunities to go out and experience things and write about them. Adults and organizations have responded great to that.

That’s what I hope to see in a year, that we’re in more schools and libraries for military kids and getting more experiences for our reporters.

Samir Husni: What motivates you to get out of bed in the morning?

Janine Boldrin: When I was a kid I wanted to be a journalist. I’ve wanted to be a writer since day one. I took a very long and winding path to get there, including getting master’s degree in manufacturing and working for IBM. One day I managed to get back to what was truly my original calling.

And what gets me out of bed is providing encouragement and opportunities to kids who also feel that, so that they don’t go down a winding path, but they see a more direct way out to what they truly see as their passion and growing their passion, because I would have loved that. I would have loved to have had that same support and someone telling me that I could do this. And that I could not only do it, but be successful. And then being shown that this is how I could do it.

That’s really what gets me out of bed is encouraging kids to, and maybe they’re not going to become journalists, but to develop their communication skills and have someone to tell them that they can do this. And that they’re stories are pretty cool.

Samir Husni: My typical last question; what keeps you up at night?

Janine Boldrin: (Laughs) What keeps me up at night? Probably my own kids. (Laughs again)

You know, military life isn’t easy; it really isn’t. My husband is gone from us more than he’s been at home and when you have three kids it’s a huge balance in making sure that everyone’s emotional needs are being met, when you’re the only parent around and your spouse is in a job that puts them in harm’s way. We’re in a society that is very disconnected from that. They don’t understand the sacrifice, truly that is made by military families and the sacrifices that our kids make. And that keeps me up at night.

It worries me and that’s really why I have the magazine too, because I need something that reminds me of why we do this and the positivity and the bright side of life that we encourage as a military kid. Our parents read our magazine too and they frequently tell me that it also reminds them of the positive side of military life.

So, it’s my own kids, military life and the challenges that presents. And it’s another reason why I started the magazine.

Samir Husni: Thank you.

The cover of the first issue of Galerie magazine premiering this April.

“Magazines should play the role of something that is, even though it might be readily available in alternative formats, visually stimulating, so that it is more pleasing. It has to have a particular niche, whether it’s a food magazine or an art magazine or a design magazine, and it has to talk to people in a way that you just can’t really get digitally. It has to fulfill a need. Let’s face it; the medium we’re talking about is a totally visual medium. And that’s what print does best.” James Cohen

“With magazines it’s about the experience and even the younger people want that. It’s just a different kind of experience.” Lisa Cohen

“The few publishers who have had the courage to print new magazines, and of course Hearst is the shining example, because they’ve come up with three winners in the last four or five years, that shows if you have the courage of your convictions and if you have a niche and you can find the right audience and publish something that people want to read, then there should be a future here.” (On the future of the newsstands) James Cohen

The passion of art and the intricacies of design come together to create a beautiful new upscale magazine called Galerie that is set to launch in April. The magazine was founded by Lisa and James Cohen, the owners of Hudson News, one of North America’s largest and oldest independent wholesalers of periodicals. The Cohens have been in the magazine industry their whole lives, and Lisa, founder and editorial director, had always wanted to publish a magazine that would make art approachable and showcase it in a lifestyle context. They are also passionate collectors, and feel with Galerie they are tapping into an audience they personally know and that has an insatiable interest for both art and design.

However, Galerie is not a typical design publication. Here the art might drive the decor as opposed to most shelter magazines where the design comes first – the philosophy is that art and design are equal. Their mission is for the magazine to become the platform for emerging and established artists and designers to showcase their work and ideas.

I spoke with James and Lisa recently and we talked about the magazine and their goals for its future. They are no strangers to magazines or the magazine business. They have been in the newsstand business for most of their lives and feel that niche print is key to today’s good health when it comes to the newsstand. Along with Editor-in-Chief, Suzy Slesin, design publishing veteran (NYT, H&G and O at Home), the Cohens hope to break new ground with a fresh approach and present information in accessible, innovative and creative ways.

The passion that Lisa Cohen feels for art, design and the magazine is fairly palpable as she talks about the strengths and uniqueness that is Galerie. And James is a staunch supporter and believes that Galerie will offer its readers a different look into the worlds of both art and design.

So, I hope that you enjoy this most “artful” conversation as Mr. Magazine™ talks with two people who have a great love and passion for art, design, newsstand and magazines, James and Lisa Cohen, Founders, Galerie Magazine.

But first, the soundbites:

On whether anyone has asked them if they’ve lost their minds because they’re starting a print magazine in this digital age (Lisa Cohen): (Laughs) No, it’s actually been just the opposite. It’s really refreshing in this industry; everyone seems to be having a great response. It shows a different niche and we feel it’s more of an enthusiast magazine and the type of publication that people will subscribe to. And it will grow into a website; we are working on that.

On whether they believe there’s still hope for the newsstands (James Cohen): As I said, print is morphing. I’m a proponent of the newsstand business and it’s changed radically, but there is still going to be a niche there and as long as people want to feel something that’s tactile; that’s graphically interesting, print is going to be around.

On the magazine being something more than ink on paper, but an actual experience for the reader (Lisa Cohen): There is such a huge interest all over the globe in the art world. And people really want to be a part of that and know more about it. As I have said before, there are magazines that are just about art; there are interior design home magazines that are just about that, and there are fashion magazines that are just about fashion and travel that covers travel, but this magazine brings it all together and shows how art influences all those different genres of design. So, I feel it’s a very full experience.

On the concept and what makes Galerie unique (James Cohen): What has to happen in a rapidly changing world is that magazines need to stay relevant in order to stay popular. And obviously, we’ve seen what happened with categories that either weren’t timely or weren’t relevant; the newsweeklies for instance. They were usurped, but this magazine doesn’t have an issue with a timeliness subject, but it does have a relevance to creating a demand for something.

On the low cover price of $7.95 (James Cohen): Well that was a consensus decision that we all thought was appropriate for the simple reason that to be successful on the newsstand on a very small niche level or on a mass level, what I learned 35 years ago was that price should not be an impediment to buying it. And we wanted to have, even within this niche, as wide an audience as possible, so of there was an interest and they picked up a copy, the last thing that we wanted was for the price to be an issue.

On what they thought about the finished product of the magazine (James Cohen): I saw the pages before they were bound and they looked very nice, but you know, it was nothing like when I actually saw the magazine. I was so thrilled to have the paper quality and the print quality come out the way it did, because we’re competing for people’s attention with a whole bunch of other titles sitting on a newsstand or on a rack in a book chain and the magazine really jumps out and that’s what you need.

On Lisa’s involvement with organizations and schools, such as the Hetrick-Martin Institute, and how she incorporates that passion into the magazine (Lisa Cohen): I became involved through some friends I have in the interior design world. And basically I was just born into it through putting together a big fundraiser for them in the Hamptons last summer. Before that they had asked me to come up and see the school, so I went up to visit and I was just so impressed by what this school was doing for these young, creative minds; kids that would have been otherwise on the streets and without opportunities in life and some of them maybe committing suicide and just facing total destruction. I thought by tying it into the magazine it would be an even more passionate project for me and even more gratifying.

On how the Cohens’ wraparound staircase wound up on the cover of the first issue of the magazine (Lisa Cohen): Well, it wasn’t my idea, let’s put it that way. I didn’t want to have anything of my property in the first issue. But when Suzanne saw what I did there, it was her first introduction in learning about who I am, how I think and what I’m about. And she felt that the message was so strong about me that she felt the opposite and that it should be in the magazine’s first issue to introduce me and to show part of my world. It was just very lucky that I met Suzanne because she’s been a fantastic editor to work with.

On the major challenge they will have to face (James Cohen): Getting out the message about this and expanding its reach throughout the industry and throughout the enthusiast world and the digital world, is going to be our challenge, to expand its reach and to make it even more attractive for advertisers to keep coming in.

On the role of magazines in today’s digital age (James Cohen): They should play the role of something that is, even though it might be readily available in alternative formats, visually stimulating, so that it is more pleasing. It has to have a particular niche, whether it’s a food magazine or an art magazine or a design magazine, and it has to talk to people in a way that you just can’t really get digitally.

On people’s return to print (James Cohen): You know the most significant drop in newsstand is coming from the mass celebrity books where they have the most readily available alternatives. And as that settles in those drops will mitigate. The last four months or so of the business, sales have dropped less and we’re not sure if this the start of a trend or not, but at a certain point we feel that the migration is going to cease because everyone, and you’re not talking about the print magazine versus the digital version of it, you’re talking about competing for people’s time.

On the newsstands’ future (Janes Cohen): The future of our newsstands is as I said; at some point in the future sales will stabilize at a certain level. And I think it was a combination of a lot of things that happened, whether it was the digital influx or the recession; the consolidation of wholesalers was another factor. All of these things contributed to the drop in sales. But the few publishers who have had the courage to print new magazines, and of course Hearst is the shining example, because they’ve come up with three winners in the last four or five years, that shows if you have the courage of your convictions and if you have a niche and you can find the right audience and publish something that people want to read, then there should be a future here.

On anything else they’d like to add (Lisa Cohen): I’m hoping that it will have a major digital component with e-commerce and be able to offer opportunities to emerging artists to sell their work, where they ordinarily wouldn’t have the opportunity to. And I’m very excited about that.

On what someone would find them doing if they showed up unannounced one evening at their home (Lisa Cohen): Definitely you would see a lot of magazines. (Laughs) In every room there are stacks. I love reading magazines. I still find it a very enjoyable experience.

On what someone would find them doing if they showed up unannounced one evening at their home (James Cohen): You would either find me on the phone with my business, or reading magazines, or yes, even watching The Donald. (Laughs)

On what keeps them up at night (James Cohen): We have four children, three of whom are young adults. And obviously, we think a lot about how they’re going to make their way in the world and be happy. So, those are our concerns.

And now the lightly edited transcript of the Mr. Magazine™ interview with James and Lisa Cohen, Founders, Galerie Magazine.

Samir Husni: According to the prophets of doom and gloom; the newsstands are going down the drain and print is going down the drain with them. And having worked for most of your life with the newsstands since you’re in wholesaling, I’m sure you’ve heard all of this. And Lisa, I have to say that you’ve created one of the most beautiful magazines that I’ve seen in a long time, but with all of the negativity flowing from the naysayers’ mouths; has anyone asked you both yet if you’ve lost it, starting a print magazine in this digital age?

Lisa Cohen: (Laughs) No, it’s actually been just the opposite. It’s really refreshing in this industry; everyone seems to be having a great response. It shows a different niche and we feel it’s more of an enthusiast magazine and the type of publication that people will subscribe to. And it will grow into a website; we are working on that.

James Cohen: If I could take a stab at your question from the business side; it’s not that print is dying; print is changing. I think it’s radically changing and I believe the mass channels that have dominated the print category for as long as we can remember have declined the most. The niche categories, to the extent that they still represent something unique that people want, have fared better.

Even the bigger launches of the last few years, as few and far between as they have been, take Hearst’s products, for example; they’re niche products, whether it’s the Food Network or Dr. Oz The Good Life; those are specific niche categories that people like. This magazine is even more of a specialized category because Lisa is attempting to put together two related fields in a way that they’ve never been put together before in design. And as we just said, the mass design magazines are what they are; this is not one of those, this is more of the personalities behind the stories: the art directors, the artists and the designers. We’re trying to reach a very special audience. Not a huge audience, but a very special one that really loves this category and I don’t think anyone has done that before.

Samir Husni: James, as an ink on paper, wholesale distributor, do you feel that by launching this new title you’re putting your money where your mouth is, so to speak, that there’s still hope for the newsstands?

James Cohen: Sure. As I said, print is morphing. I’m a proponent of the newsstand business and it’s changed radically, but there is still going to be a niche there and as long as people want to feel something that’s tactile; that’s graphically interesting, print is going to be around.

Lisa Cohen: This kind of magazine that is so visual; you really can’t capture that on a mobile device.

Samir Husni: And Lisa you mentioned in your introductory letter that you are inviting people to experience this magazine and engage in that artistic living adventure. So, you’re not just viewing it as ink on paper, but rather that you’re creating something to actually be experienced. Can you expand a little on that?

Lisa Cohen: It’s like an evolution. I think it will grow and have branches and many leaves that will come out of this. I’m seeing now that it’s just starting, a lot of different avenues are opening up; I’m doing these art and design shows where I’m bringing the experience with me.

James Cohen: The category itself is a very growing category.

Lisa Cohen: That is true. There is such a huge interest all over the globe in the art world. And people really want to be a part of that and know more about it. As I have said before, there are magazines that are just about art; there are interior design home magazines that are just about that, and there are fashion magazines that are just about fashion and travel that covers travel, but this magazine brings it all together and shows how art influences all those different genres of design. So, I feel it’s a very full experience.

And it’s also an experience in the way that we break it down and bring out the artist and the entities that work on all the different design projects. And then there’s a discussion on each of them that we write about, and that talks about them, their careers and the creative process behind each project.

So, my goal is to bring that creative process out and break it down so that people can enjoy that and be motivated from one artistic eye to another.

Samir Husni: I noticed that you’re very first adjective in describing the magazine is curated. And you distinguish it by having it in the color red on the cover. Do you feel that you’re more of a curator of art with this new magazine, Galerie, rather than a creator or an editor?

Lisa Cohen: Yes, I do. That was my concept.

Samir Husni: Explain a little about that concept, if you would. The two of you literally grew up surrounded by magazines. People can come to my office and see me surrounded by magazines, but you grew your entire lives around them. Differentiate this concept for me, because a lot of people are going to look at it and say, if a major wholesaler is starting a magazine like Galerie, they must know something that we don’t. What’s that something that you know that some people on the outside does not know?

Lisa Cohen: I think it’s what Jim was talking about when he said the niche titles were doing well. They’re holding more ground. Right, Jim?

James Cohen: Yes, what has to happen in a rapidly changing world is that magazines need to stay relevant in order to stay popular. And obviously, we’ve seen what happened with categories that either weren’t timely or weren’t relevant; the newsweeklies for instance. They were usurped, but this magazine doesn’t have an issue with a timeliness subject, but it does have a relevance to creating a demand for something.

Lisa Cohen: And it’s growing art culture, really.

James Cohen: Yes, and that hasn’t been addressed. Mostly, traditional art magazines have been around a long time and they have a very staid approach to things and Galerie is going to be different.

Lisa Cohen: This is more about the experience and it’s more multifaceted.

James Cohen: And we know that the world has changed; we’re not putting a half a million copies out; it’s going to have its niche. It’s not even a mass supermarket book like most large newsstand titles are; there will be a niche. We’re going to airports; the top book chains in the country; and we’re going to the top independents that have the best demographics.

Lisa Cohen: And quite possibly the private airports.

James Cohen: Yes and we’re also obviously going to be sending copies to target our audience better, whether it’s private airports or to collectors; people in the trade. So, it will be a targeted and intelligent approach; not a crazy mass one.

Samir Husni: Jim, as a wholesaler, why this reasoning? I mean, you know more about this than probably anybody else in the industry. I expected to see a cover price of $15 or $20, so I was really stunned when I saw $7.95.

James Cohen: Right. Well that was a consensus decision that we all thought was appropriate for the simple reason that to be successful on the newsstand on a very small niche level or on a mass level, what I learned 35 years ago was that price should not be an impediment to buying it. And we wanted to have, even within this niche, as wide an audience as possible, so of there was an interest and they picked up a copy, the last thing that we wanted was for the price to be an issue. We wanted to reach out with as broad a net as we could. This magazine is not living or dying on newsstand revenues; it has its traditional base and that’s between ads, subscriptions and hopefully digital moving forward. It’ll have several different revenue sources that will make it work.

Samir Husni: Let me ask you a very biased question; when the first issue was completed and you took a look at it, what did you think? Did you look at Lisa and say, wow! Or did you ask, Lisa, what have we done? (Laughs)

James Cohen: I saw the pages before they were bound and they looked very nice, but you know, it was nothing like when I actually saw the magazine. I was so thrilled to have the paper quality and the print quality come out the way it did, because we’re competing for people’s attention with a whole bunch of other titles sitting on a newsstand or on a rack in a book chain and the magazine really jumps out and that’s what you need.

Samir Husni: And Lisa, the magazine is also a movement. You’re putting not only your passion for art into it, but also you’re helping with organizations and schools, such as your role with the Hetrick-Martin Institute and the Harvey Milk School. Explain this mixed interest of yours and how you’re channeling that into the magazine.

Lisa Cohen: I became involved through some friends I have in the interior design world. And basically I was just born into it through putting together a big fundraiser for them in the Hamptons last summer. Before that they had asked me to come up and see the school, so I went up to visit and I was just so impressed by what this school was doing for these young, creative minds; kids that would have been otherwise on the streets and without opportunities in life and some of them maybe committing suicide and just facing total destruction.

So, by doing for these kids; you have no idea, you create a life. And these are very sensitive, wonderful and creative minds and it’s a big part of the art world. And I feel that one leads to the other and protecting and giving these young people a chance is our future creative talent for tomorrow. And our world is a better place for it. It goes along with all of my basic instincts. And I thought by tying it into the magazine it would be an even more passionate project for me and even more gratifying. To be able to do something great and interesting for the readers and also to give back to the school and see that prosper.

James Cohen: And it was a great affiliation for all involved.

Lisa Cohen: It’s a great affiliation with the wonderful people who are involved in the organization. I have to say that I’m the first straight mother of four to become involved, or so they tell me. (Laughs) But I couldn’t be more passionate about helping these kids. In April, we’re doing an art house in conjunction with the launch of the magazine and we have five artists with installations in each room. And I designed two of their decorative arts around each artist.

One of the rooms we gave to the Harvey Milk High School and the kids all did what home means to them and how they relate to that. And if you walk in that room and you see these kids and their creativity, you’re just amazed at the power and energy of their work. And the wonderful feeling you get from knowing that in some small way, you’re giving back to them.

Samir Husni: Talking about art and creativity, I read in Suzanne Slesin’s letter, who you’ve tapped for editor in chief of the magazine, that she had the same feeling when she entered your home and saw the wraparound staircase that ended up on the cover of the magazine. So, tell me about the idea of the wraparound and how the art of your staircase ended up on the cover of the magazine?

Lisa Cohen: Well, it wasn’t my idea, let’s put it that way. I didn’t want to have anything of my property in the first issue. But when Suzanne saw what I did there, it was her first introduction in learning about who I am, how I think and what I’m about. And she felt that the message was so strong about me that she felt the opposite and that it should be in the magazine’s first issue to introduce me and to show part of my world.

It was just very lucky that I met Suzanne because she’s been a fantastic editor to work with. We think very much alike and I’m very happy that she, with so many years of experience in this industry, 17 years at The New York Times and all of the other magazines that she worked for, that she took me on. It was a great honor to me. It’s been a wonderful association. It’s like we’re both doing what we love. It’s a real lovefest.

Samir Husni: What has been your major stumbling block since you started this venture? Usually when people launch a new magazine or come and talk to me about launching one, they have two problems: advertising and circulation. In your case the circulation problem is solved, nobody has to go and beg the wholesaler to distribute the magazine; it’s a done deal. Right?

James Cohen: Right. And the advertising is coming along very well. And we are expecting after this first issue, which has already been very well received by all the current and potential advertisers, to ramp that up over the next couple of issues this year. Getting out the message about this and expanding its reach throughout the industry and throughout the enthusiast world and the digital world, is going to be our challenge, to expand its reach and to make it even more attractive for advertisers to keep coming in.

Samir Husni: From a distributor’s point of view, what do you think the role of magazines is in today’s digital age? What role should they play?

James Cohen: They should play the role of something that is, even though it might be readily available in alternative formats, visually stimulating, so that it is more pleasing. It has to have a particular niche, whether it’s a food magazine or an art magazine or a design magazine, and it has to talk to people in a way that you just can’t really get digitally. It has to fulfill a need.

Lisa Cohen: And also working from print and just starting to work on digital, print is such a great springboard because usually now most projects don’t have a print component like we do. For the people who are working on it, they feel it’s a great springboard.

James Cohen: And we have the luxury of being able to use the print issue as a rollout piece, not the digital, and establish ourselves through it, because let’s face it, the medium we’re talking about is a totally visual medium. And that’s what print does best.

Samir Husni: What are your future plans? I know you’re publishing three times this year and then moving to four times and using print as your core product.

Lisa Cohen: Maybe we’re just traditional and old-fashioned, but using print seems like the right decision.

Samir Husni: The Columbia Journalism Review published an article last December that said “print is the new “new” media.”

Lisa Cohen: (Laughs) Right, exactly. You’re starting to hear that people are saying that magazines maybe became diluted waiting to see what was going to happen with television now. Every form of media has been challenged over the years. But it seems like even books are coming back stronger; at least, that’s what I’ve heard from major publishers.

James Cohen: Yes, and you know the most significant drop in newsstand is coming from the mass celebrity books where they have the most readily available alternatives. And as that settles in those drops will mitigate.

The last four months or so of the business, sales have dropped less and we’re not sure if this the start of a trend or not, but at a certain point we feel that the migration is going to cease because everyone, and you’re not talking about the print magazine versus the digital version of it, you’re talking about competing for people’s time. And at some point in the future, it’s going to get fully integrated and things will stabilize, it’s just a question of when.

Lisa Cohen: Yes, I agree. And when you think about what’s happening with television, people are just watching it when they want to watch it. It’s all changing, everything is changing.

Samir Husni: Jim, talking about change, in your opinion; what’s the future of our newsstands?

James Cohen: The future of our newsstands is as I said; at some point in the future sales will stabilize at a certain level. And I think it was a combination of a lot of things that happened, whether it was the digital influx or the recession; the consolidation of wholesalers was another factor. All of these things contributed to the drop in sales.

But the few publishers who have had the courage to print new magazines, and of course Hearst is the shining example, because they’ve come up with three winners in the last four or five years, that shows if you have the courage of your convictions and if you have a niche and you can find the right audience and publish something that people want to read, then there should be a future here.

Let’s face it, the mass books of half a century ago, the Saturday Evening Post, LIFE; they all kind of gave way in a certain manner to television. And the same thing has happened with the newsweeklies and the celebrity weeklies with digital. So, they’ll find their niche, it won’t be what it used to be, but as long as publishers can put products together that people want to read, it’ll be around. And you just can’t understate that; you just have to be a little more clever and creative these days. And I think that there’s always going to be a market for it. Ten years from now it may look entirely different, but it will always be here and hopefully stabilize over the next few years.

Samir Husni: Is there anything else either of you would like to add?

Lisa Cohen: I’m hoping that it will have a major digital component with e-commerce and be able to offer opportunities to emerging artists to sell their work, where they ordinarily wouldn’t have the opportunity to. And I’m very excited about that.

Samir Husni: So, you’re really on a mission? I can hear it in the tone of your voice; you’re a woman on a mission.

James Cohen: This is Lisa’s labor of love. She is very passionate about both art and design; she is an incredibly creative person, as you can see from her work. And this is the manifestation of it and it’s great.

Lisa Cohen: After bringing up a big family, this is everything I ever wanted and it’s all coming together and it’s like a dream for me. And I think when you do something that you love, it usually shows and the product will be successful.

Samir Husni: If I showed up unannounced at your home one evening, what would I find you both doing? Reading a magazine, a book, watching television, or something else?

Lisa Cohen: Definitely you would see a lot of magazines. (Laughs) In every room there are stacks. I love reading magazines. I still find it a very enjoyable experience.

James Cohen: I even read weeklies.

Lisa Cohen: And most of my friends say I’m your best customer; so they’re all still enjoying it too. It’s not the end of magazines; it will always have its niche. With magazines it’s about the experience and even the younger people want that. It’s just a different kind of experience.

James Cohen: You would either find me on the phone with my business, or reading magazines, or yes, even watching The Donald. (Laughs)

Samir Husni: My typical last question; what keeps you both up at night?

James Cohen: In a good way or a bad way? (Laughs) We’ve been very fortunate, so a lot of things that most people worry about, we’re lucky enough to not have to. We worry about our children and what kind of future they’re going to have. And what kind of world they’re going to be in.

Lisa Cohen: It’s our family. I think that’s what occupies most of our worries.

James Cohen: We have four children, three of whom are young adults. And obviously, we think a lot about how they’re going to make their way in the world and be happy. So, those are our concerns.

Samir Husni: Thank you.