Escarpment Views’ Office Clear-Out Yard Sale
August 23rd 2010Escarpment Views is NOT closing down. But we ARE cleaning out! As we approach the end of our third year of publication, we find that we have too much stuff! It’s good stuff, but there’s a limit to everything. Also, I’d like to live with less clutter, so I’m saying bye-bye to my poo-poo and making room to breathe and move.
What we have a lot of is books. Good books. Literature. Non-fiction. Hardcovers. First editions. Some brand new, just published, that I received for review but don’t have room to keep forever. The super brand new are priced at three for $20. Older titles are a steal at $1 each.
Christmas is not that far away, so this is a good time to scoop up gifts for your bibliophile friends and relatives!
While we’re clearing out, we’re getting rid of some small tables and a bookcase, and some big wood lawn chairs. Also golf clubs and various other treasures like kitchen stuff and office supplies.
As well, we’ll be set up to give out free back issues of Escarpment Views, plus take subscriptions for you or as your gifts for others. We have a special deal for multiple subscriptions: two for $42, three for $63 and four for $84! As a friend of the magazine says, it makes a great stocking stuffer. Some notecards will be available, and you can even talk to Mike about ordering prints of any of his great photos. Remember Christmas and Hannukah and Kwanza and the winter solstice are coming!
This Sat. Aug. 28, rain or shine, from 8 a.m., our great stuff will be available at 50 Ann St. in the north end of Georgetown. Signs will be at the big curve on Hwy 7 at the Moore Park end of town.
Come and say hello, get some free copies of the magazine, and pick up some gifts and treasures for yourself or others. And help us clear out our offices!
The day after this was posted, I received a complaint about our offer of selling old review copies. The person wrote that publishers would object to us making a profit from the books and that the money raised should be donated to “something worthwhile.”
I replied with a long note about how selling review copies is a common practice among all the media outlets I have experience with, that used bookstores get good inventory this way, and that “profit” is an interesting question. I know of non profits that pay annual salaries of $300,000!
But really, the only point I needed to make is that this person doesn’t object to selling review copies as such. She’s annoyed that the money isn’t going to “something worthwhile,” presumably a charity or non-profit group of her choice.
At Escarpment Views we have to be thrifty to survive. We’re also committed to the practice of reuse as much as possible. Any money we make goes toward the magazine’s survival. Extra money will go toward paying our staff, contributing writers and photographers, better rates.
I guess the main point of this person’ complaint is her impression that we’re making piles of profit, and that Escarpment Views is not something that’s worthwhile.
There’s good news as well as bad in her impression. It’s disturbing that she doesn’t think our environmental, pro-world biosphere reserve mandate is important. But I guess it’s great that the magazine seems highly successful and profitable. It’s only by becoming financially viable that we’ll be able to do all the good work we have as goals for the magazine.
Escarpment Views Flies Out Advertisers’ Locations!
June 21st 2010We’ve been starting to get responses to our summer issue. Some of them are so interesting that I hope we’ll have room to publish them on our letters page.
As for other reactions, we’ve had praise for the centre photo spread, as we always do, and Mike enjoys bragging that he’s sleeping with his centrefold model. She’s cute and has a great tail, but is very hairy, with a wet black nose and four paws, in case you’re wondering.
We’ve heard from people whose gardens we featured. “Look at my garden!” one of them told Mike. “It doesn’t look that way now.” Well, we know how gardens change from week to week. And the gardener was seen proudly showing other people her photo. An aquaintance of mine emailed that she wants to be in the garden on the cover. Someone stopped us on the street to say to Mike “You take photos underwater now too?” A Chamber of Commerce in the Georgian Bay area of the Niagara Escarpment told us that it’s a wonderful magazine and they’re proud to display it.
One of our advertisers wrote “Wow!” and that she loved the variety of articles. When she makes up “goodie bags,” she includes copies of Escarpment Views. What a great idea!
Other people have reported that copies are “flying” out of their locations. I’ve heard that readers are planning to go to some of the places that have been advertised in our magazine, because they’ve only learned about them from their ads with us. Mike had someone tell him that after seeing a restaurant ad in our issue, the man remembered “That’s a great place. Excellent fish and chips.”
But we’re already getting busy with our Autumn issue. We’d love to get your events for our calendar covering Sept. 1 to Dec. 1. Send them to us for free listings in print, on this website, or both.
And if you want to advertise your business, festival, event or service in our Autumn issue, get back to us or your local sales rep. Our ad space reservations will close July 25. You’ll have until Aug. 1 for the final artwork. Be part of our great Autumn issue and you can share in the interest our next issue will generate!
Do you have anything to share about what you liked or didn’t like about our summer issue?
If you’d like to get your own free copy, pick one up from one of our advertisers near you, or contact us for your free trial issue.
Gardens Galore Summer Issue of Escarpment Views Available Now
June 07th 2010The summer issue of Escarpment Views is available for free pick up now from many of our advertisers. Drop in on one in your neighbourhood and tell them you came for a copy.
This issue is our gardens galore spectacular, with features on growing mighty delphiniums, and some of the lovely private gardens that were on horticultural tours in Niagara-on-the-Lake and Georgetown last year.
As well, Mike takes you underwater off the Bruce Peninsula to some of the shallow shipwrecks you can see from kayak or by snorkelling. His photographs are unusual views you certainly don’t see frequently. As I’ve said before, he will do almost anything and go almost anywhere to get compelling photos.
We present a ferry ride on the Chi-Cheemaun with an interview with Captain Adams and photographs of the bridge, the ship and what you see while sailing between Tobermory and South Baymouth.
Our featured centre photograph is a stone beach, on the north shore of Manitoulin Island, where the Niagara Escarpment reappears in Lake Huron. This is one of the properties protected by the Escarpment Biosphere Conservancy. We hear that some people are collecting, framing & hanging up these centre photos! I have to admit that my own office walls are getting covered with them.
We also celebrate the local freshness available at farmers’ markets, especially Georgetown Farmers’ Market and Ottawa Street Farmers’ Market in Hamilton.
What looks interesting to you in this issue?
Of course, instead of having to go out and pick up a copy, you can subscribe and get Escarpment Views coming to you!
If you missed the spring issue, some of the articles are available here, or you can contact us to order a copy that we’ll mail to you for $5.25 until July 1. Then it’ll cost $5.65 because of the HST.
Escarpment Views Noticed at MagNet
June 05th 2010Mike and I attended MagNet last week, a national conference for the Canadian magazine industry. On one day we sat in on sessions about the Canada Periodical Fund and about Canada Post, but we didn’t learn much that was new or helpful to us. That’s partly thanks to the Independent Publishers’ Association of Ontario, which we are part of, and which had a meeting recently about the changes to the federal periodical fund.
I think there’s value in attending a professional development seminar even when you don’t learn anything new, if only so that you get confirmation that your knowledge is current.
The next day we attended sessions that were jam-packed with new ideas and information. I went to “Circulation Solutions on a Small Budget” by Faith Drinnan, Mike attended “The Fundamentals of Advertising Sales” by Gwen Dunant and we both heard “Small Magazine Creative Marketing Solutions” discussed by three panellists.
While we scribbled down plenty of notes from these sessions, a strong sense that remains is that people seem to be impressed by Escarpment Views. Thanks to Mike’s fearlessness in handing out copies of our summer issue, lots of people talked to us about the magazine. An editor I’ve known for a long time said she envies us for starting our own magazine that’s a success! One of the panellists even held up a copy saying that we’re doing a lot of neat things, and then used it as an example of ways to try to get advertisers to take bigger spaces. The fact that we have already tried the techniques he mentioned was not as important as the promotion and recognition he gave us. He wouldn’t have used Escarpment Views as an example if it was poor.
I was exhausted by two solid days of meeting people and taking in information but MagNet was definitely worth going to. Now the challenge is to actually implement the many good ideas we were given.
What conferences have you found helpful and why?
If you liked this post you may want to read “Celebrating Two Years of Publishing Escarpment Views!”
Don’t forget to subscribe before July 1 to beat the HST!
If You Can Get Escarpment Views for Free, Why Subscribe?
May 18th 2010We’re on standby here, waiting for the printer’s call to say that the first copies of the summer issue are ready. We’re updating our mailing list, and this reminds me to explain again why you would bother to subscribe if you can get a copy for free from our advertisers.
We value the support of our subscribers and we make sure you are among the very first to get each issue in your mail. You don’t have to leave your home because you’ll get Escarpment Views at your door!
As a plus, if you provide your email address, we’ll notify you about free tickets and other offers that we occasionally make available through this website. The value of what you could receive can be far more than the cost of your subscription.
Right now there’s another reason to subscribe before July 1 and that is to beat the HST! Subscriptions for four great keeper issues are $21 before July 1 and $22 after. You can save even more by subscribing for two years at $36.75! After July 1 it will cost $39.50.
First crack at each issue. No need to leave your home for it. Free online giveaways. Saving money. Four good reasons to get four great issues a year!
Appearance on Behind The Story
April 17th 2010If you’re looking for something to watch on TV Sunday night, you might want to go to CTSTV (channel 36 for some people) at 7 pm for Behind The Story. I (Gloria Hildebrandt) am a guest on the show. Hosted by Richard Landau, the program has journalists and commentators discussing the media’s treatment of various issues in the news.
This week the topics are the pharmacies’ threatened service cuts, the Helena Guergis affair, the Roman Catholic Church’s statement about paedophilia and more.
And I get to share some news about the Niagara Escarpment in the U.S.
New Online Event Listings
March 04th 2010 Due to the wealth of great information we’re getting about public events happening up and down the Escarpment, we’ve just added a new Calendar of Events! These listings are FREE for anyone who sends us the information. If there’s a webpage with complete details about the event, make sure you give us the link so we can easily point people to it.
If you want the public to know about your event, this free calendar listing will help spread the word. Make sure you tell your contacts to check the calendar for your details.
Send us your info and give us a few days to post it. We love to spread the news about things that are on, all along the Niagara Escarpment.
Spring 2010 Out, But So Are Thieves!
February 25th 2010 It’s a case of good news, bad news. The good news: our spring issue has been mailed out to our subscribers, giving them first crack at it as always, and we’re hearing good things about it. One of my nephews particularly likes one of the ads on page 15, so you’ll have to check that out. It may not be to everyone’s taste! Let me know what you think of it.
We’ve also done something different with our centre spread, but early responses to it are either approving or unconcerned. If our audience doesn’t mind, we may do more of this.
The bad news is that even in the rural countryside close to the Niagara Escarpment, where it has been safe for decades, thieves are at work. In the middle of the night recently, our cars were opened and an electronic device was stolen. Our border collie security system was off duty, although she clocks in at the slightest sound of a racoon on the verandah. The theft might not have happened had the cars been locked, although there’s the chance that a window could have been smashed during the theft. I would rather have the thief steal without damaging the car. Motion detector lights could have been a deterrent, but they are annoying because they go off even when a racoon, deer or coyote strolls by. I don’t want to scare off wildlife, I choose to live close to them.
The police were happy to take my report, even coming by to dust my car for fingerprints, a private, interesting CSI episode in my own driveway! We may not lock our cars, but we no longer leave anything of value in them, either. Beware and be advised: even on the Escarpment, there are some unkind people taking advantage of our easy lifestyle.
Niagara Greenbelt Website Introduced
January 01st 2010 While surfing around one day last month, I came upon a page about Escarpment Views magazine on the new Niagara Greenbelt website. Information had been posted about our magazine from published issues and our own website. It was surprising to see this and I felt honoured that they had decided to create a page for us. After contacting the organizers, we offered to provide some missing images and information, which they quickly added. Now we have a complete profile that we’re proud to point to people.
The Niagara Greenbelt website is a comprehensive and impressive source of information for visitors to the beautiful Niagara Region. It is user-focussed and innovative, letting people design and create their own trips and itineraries. The site uses several web technologies to provide as much detailed information as desired. See their overview description of what’s included in their site.
The website is evolving and growing and some of the indexing looks like it needs tweaking. This will probably happen as people let them know about fixes that are needed. Another point to note is that the site probably works best with high-speed access. Without it, the pages take a long time to appear. A lot of patience is needed to get around.
It’s a mammoth project to create a searchable, customizable database of this scope, so the organizers should be congratulated on their achievement.
Gift Idea: Escarpment Views Notecards
December 18th 2009 Just in time for last-minute Christmas shopping, we’re announcing a new page on our website, where we hope to offer unique products for sale. We have begun by showing Escarpment Views blank notecards.
I always have blank notecards available. I use them for all occasions, writing my own messages for birthdays, congratulations, sometimes condolences. I even use them for letters to friends and relatives. A “real” card in the mail can be a great pleasure.
Our notecards feature some of Mike Davis’ most popular photography of places near the Niagara Escarpment: the first four magazine cover photos, Scotsdale Farm and flowering lilac bushes. These photos have produced a lot of “Aahs” from viewers.
You get eight cards and envelopes for $10 plus GST and mailing. If you happen to want more copies of any images, let us know. We’ll customize your order at no extra charge! If you want the notecards by Dec. 24, let us know and we’ll rush them to you.
Do you have other photographs from the magazine that you’d like to see as notecards? And do you have ideas for other interesting products we can offer through our website? Don’t be shy about promoting your own work if you have something cool. Leave a comment and share your ideas.