Pandemic Publishing Roundtable: “I Used to Be Somebody” – Planning Your Next Act With Carl Landau

By, Linda Ruth

Editor’s Note: The “Pandemic Publishing Roundtable” started a few weeks after the closing of most Barnes & Noble stores instigated a smattering of new articles proclaiming the end of that storied chain and the end of magazines at retail. While it is true that prior to the pandemic the future of single copy sales of magazines was at best a tenuous proposition, it’s death didn’t seem likely to happen any time soon. So once again, I was aggravated with the conventional wisdom of those who write about magazines. 

I reached out to my colleague, Linda Ruth and together we came up with the idea of starting a weekly roundtable discussion with other members of the publishing community. We could talk about almost anything. We could invite other publishers, distributors, consultants to come and talk with us. 

As we were all isolated from our places of work, the meetings became a great help this year in maintaining a feeling of connectedness to something, anything. 

The article below, is the write up my colleague, Linda Ruth wrote and was posted in the BoSacks newsletter, and on his website. Joe Berger January 19, 2021

Carl Landau, founder of Pickleball Media and publisher of the podcast and newsletter I Used to Be Somebody joined the Pandemic Roundtable—Joe Berger, Sherin Pierce, Samir Husni, Bo Sacks, Gemma Peckham, and me—to talk about what to do after you finish doing what you’ve been doing all this time.

Joe: You used to own and run the popular Niche Publishing Conference for the magazine industry, and sold your company a couple of years ago, so I’m very interested in hearing what you have to say about second and third acts. 

Carl: Yes, I sold Niche Publishing to Second Street Media a year and a half ago. They are a platform for contests—they bought us for our database of 18,000 publishers. I worked for them part time for a year to help with the transition—which was a peaceful one. The year gave me my first opportunity since my paper route when I was 14 to have a part time job. It was refreshing.   After that, my wife and I planned to travel. Then COVID hit. This left me thinking about what to do with my time, experience, and energy. And my mind turned to podcasting.

Eight years ago I did a podcast—Events: What Wakes You up at 3 am. It was a lot of fun, and garnered some interest, but I had a full time job, and really couldn’t sustain it. What I enjoyed most about it was building the audience.   And I love podcasts; I listen to four or five of them every day. You’ll find that media companies selling for a lot of money are podcast forward. Several that produce podcasts have sold for over 200 million. Now there are hundreds of thousands of podcasts, and smart companies looking for growth areas turn to them as another way to build audience. 

Sherin: Podcasts are great because they’re so portable. You can be out for a walk and learning about a subject. 

Joe: The podcasts that are successful—where does their money come from? The events they throw? Advertising? 

Carl: Sponsorship. Some podcasts have audiences of millions. That’s bigger than mainstream news. I just sold my first sponsorship, starting in March, after 12 episodes. My first weekly episode came out in October.   For me, the demographic that is most interesting is the Baby Boomers. There are 80 million of us. Ten thousand people a day turn 65. And that will continue another 5-6 years. For baby boomers, there are at least 25 podcasts about money, by financial advisors. I was more interested in what boomers might do for a second act.   Twenty years ago, you were done at sixty. Now continuing on is the rule, rather than the exception. 

Carl Landau of Pickleball Media – Source: https://pickleballmediahq.com

Linda: Do you think that’s because of the nature of the people turning sixty, or because Social Security has been pushed back? 

Carl: I think it’s a combination. We’re also living a lot longer. If you’re going to make it into your 80s, that’s a lot of post-retirement time on your hands. 

Bo: Does what happens vary by industry? In publishing we have a consistent pattern of getting rid of institutional memory. When you turn 65ish—you’re gone. You make too much money and you get to save the company’s bottom line. It is a historic pattern.  

Carl: I see that everywhere, in every industry. An amazing amount of wealth and intelligence is concentrated in this group—and yet it is mostly ignored by the media.  I Used to Be Somebody is for people who had successful careers and now want to do something entirely different. I like to get emotionally involved with them, find out who that person is, what they’ve done. That’s my format, and it’s how I engage my audience, which has grown in this short time to almost 1300 subscribers. 

Joe: Your company is called Pickleball Media. Should we be looking for a pickleball magazine to come out sometime soon? 

Carl: There is one. Pickleball is the fastest-growing sport in the US. Close to 5 million people play it, and no one’s heard of it! If it weren’t for pandemic, it was going to explode this year. This is what’s really helped me in this transition. Getting out of the familiar thing I’ve been doing for 20 years has energized me incredibly. I’ve been doing all this new stuff, podcasts, pickleball, and learning new things. It’s been really fun having this year to explore these opportunities. And that happens a lot with the people I interview. One big time lawyer took up photography and poetry. Those are the stories I explore in my podcast. It’s been really inspiring talking to these people. Having a podcast gives a forum you can talk to people you’d never have otherwise met. 

Linda: Could you distribute podcasts for other people? 

Carl: I wouldn’t, but there are lots of people who do it. There are so many opportunities, so many directions to go in. There is room for another event in the field, focusing on teaching people how to do podcasts, how to sell sponsorships. Right now I’m teaching older people how to listen to a podcast. So far I’ve taught 40 people, and it’s helped them a lot.   This is a field that costs next to nothing to get in. 

Sherin: What you need is good equipment and a good story. 

Carl: That’s right, and the equipment costs like nothing. You can get a good microphone for eighty dollars. I use Zencastr to record for $20 a month and it’s like I’m in the same room with my guest. Between the prep, recording, and editing, one episode takes 8 hours to put together.   I use Lidsyn for distribution and that’s $20 a month, and it gets you on Apple, Spotify, and 20 other platforms. They provide a report, too. I Used to Be Somebody is already in 60 countries. We have over 60 people in India alone that listen to my podcast.   Joe: How would somebody begin their second act?  

Carl: I’m the jump in the pool sort. My wife is more the ease into it sort. You could do it either way. But some people, if they jump in too soon, feel that they haven’t given themselves enough time to get a sense of what they could do. And a lot of times they end up doing the same thing they were doing—which is not what you want to end up doing.  Go within your network, talk to your friends. Ask them what they could envision you doing that you’re not doing, maybe haven’t considered. These are the kinds of things that come out in my interviews; it’s why interviewing is the most fun. It can take six or eight before you get comfortable. The way to bring it to life is, don’t worry so much about what your questions are, but make it a real conversation. 

Bo: It’s worth pointing out that you have a magic way of engaging. You did it in the Niche conferences, where you got people to engage with you and, most magically, got them to engage with each other. I saw that same methodology in the podcast.

  

Carl: Most of the people I interview have been interviewed dozens of times. I try to make it new, to humanize them with questions that they might not get as often. 

Joe: Is there a way to track if people listen to the ads? 

Carl: Not that I know of, and the download reports I get also don’t tell anything about the audience, except how many listened and where they’re from. That makes podcasts different from other media. What’s helped a lot is before I started the podcast I started the newsletter. You know your newsletter audience, and you drop the newsletter promoting each podcast.   Beyond that, audience growth tends to be word of mouth. Someone likes your podcast, and tells a friend about it, and the friend goes back and starts at episode one and listens on through. 

Sherin: AARP would be a huge audience. They have a ton of members in the demographic, many of whom would benefit. 

Joe: I can also refer you to a company called Get Set Up. It’s an interactive learning platform for adults 55 and above—taught by seniors, for seniors. 

Carl: Over half of aspiring entrepreneurs are Baby Boomers, and 1 in 5 people who remain working after age 65 are self-employed. It’s really different from what we’ve seen in previous generations.

Editor’s Note: You can download the Podcast, “I Used to Be Somebody” on Sticher, Apple and many other podcasting applications.

A BoSacks Reader Speaks Out

Precision Media Group leader Bob Sacks was an early adopter and claims to have America’s “Oldest e-Newsletter”. Five days a week you can open up your email and find three interesting and timely articles Bob has selected that cover a variety of trends and topics of interest to the magazine media business. Bob often includes his own insight and wit to many of the articles. On a regular basis he collects and then publishes the thoughts and responses from his readers.

Two weeks ago, I posted “Maybe We Should Rephrase The Question”, asking if perhaps it was time to stop lamenting the decline of the newsstand and instead see what was working and how we could replicate that on a grander scale. The post appeared in the newsletter and along with a huge lift in visitors to this blog, one of Bob’s readers responded to the post with a series of suggestions on lifting newsstand sales.

I’ve reposted the questions below along with my own answers. The questions are good and I hope they spark a discussion about what works, doesn’t work, and could work on the modern newsstand:

Question: What if there were five times as many places one could buy a magazine (not every magazine, but a magazine)?

At a national level something like that has happened – although not to the level you  propose nor in terms of the quantity of retailers with mainline magazine racks.

There are many places now where the “newsstand” is a select group of titles that reflect what the retailer carries. Home Depot, Orschelns Farm & Home and Toys R Us are just three examples.

Twenty-five years ago, many chains in these categories did not carry magazines.

 

Question: What if we made the newsstand inconvenient?  Like only one in a community instead of every line at the grocery?

You must be thinking that scarcity would drive up demand?

In some communities newsstands are scarce. But perhaps not in the way you are imagining.

The local wholesaler no longer exists and neither do the bookstores or newsstands that the company owned. Locally owned stores or regional chains (Think Arbor Drugs in Michigan or an IGA Supermarket) that used to carry a large assortment of magazines have been sold and merged into a national chain and the only place to get a magazine is at the Wal-Mart or Walgreens. Both now have smaller mainlines and checkouts.

The question isn’t so much scarcity of magazines so much as the dip in demand for newsstand copies of magazines and the changing habits of the shopper.

Question: What if newsstands were a drive-through?   

Interesting! There is (or used to be) a “drive through” convenience store chain in northern Ohio. I do recall them on some “dealer guides” (remember those?) back in the day.

A more modern variation on that could be the “Pick Up” locations that the grocery chain Peapod has developed. But you’d have to have a committed program with the retailer. This means that someone in the current chain of delivery would have to think the idea is worth pursuing.

Frankly, it would be great (and simple) to include single copies of magazines in home deliveries of goods. My concern would be how to get the public to buy in and make it a habbit.

 

Question: What if magazines were sold in pairs of titles rather than one at a time at retail?

Clearly this question was asked by someone who has never seen an adult magazine “pack”.

Tongue now out of cheek: That is happening on some levels. Hearst sold a “pack” of their Fall Fashion titles this year in a gift box. Fantastic idea!

Local city publishers will often polybag a “Home” or “Fashion” supplement with their main title.

The real issue is always cost. Doing this isn’t cheap. ROI is not guaranteed. Think of the challenge if it were a case of “co-publishing” and two different publishers were involved.

And staffing. Having enough people around to make it happen is usually a challenge.

 

Question: How can we enhance the value of the single copy?

By charging a more realistic price for a subscription?

Question: What if single copies were sold and distributed monthly to people who meet for social reasons already?   

A great idea! Let’s staff up!

In the audited circulation world, that can often be looked at as “verified” or some sort of club membership subscription – not single copy. Or it could also be some sort of paid bulk circulation. Again, the issue is finding the right group, selling them on the title, getting them to agree to a price that will pay for itself, and making the effort worth the while.

As an example, a sports book I once worked with had the great idea of selling the magazine as an added value to local sports clubs. Great idea. But hours of labor to find, locate and then sell the program to one local club would at best yield a hundred or more in a bulk delivery at a severe discount. It’s often a question of resources. Time, Inc. or Hearst may have the resources, a small circ title doesn’t.

 

Question: What if a fresh People magazine went home with every customer at a hair salon?

Joe Ripp is a little busy right now. And, see above for AAM circulation rules.

Question: What if a fresh copy of Real Simple went home with everyone who spent $50 at Home Depot the first week of every month?

See above. But I imagine that if an RS competitor is reading this….

Your timing is perfect! At a client meeting last week, we pitched this idea for a different title in a totally different retail environment. It is still on the tickle list so we’ll see where it goes when we meet with the buyer.

Question: What if newsstands become emporiums that sold what was advertised in the magazine(s) associated with the emporium?

If I’m reading this question correctly, you’re suggesting that a publisher try to compete with Wal-Mart in both physical and e-commerce?

If I’m not (reading this correctly), in reality one of the “pros” that we use when we pitch a magazine to a retailer for authorization is that the people who read the magazine will be in their stores looking at their wares and that the products advertised in the magazine are already in the store.

A more advanced variation on this theme can, and should be: Some level of cooperation between the publisher, manufacturer and retailer to bring potential readers into the store and purchase both the magazine and the ware. To varying degrees of success, publishers have attempted this. However, the idea is far more simple than the execution and it again, often comes down to a question of staffing and ROI.

Does Bob’s reader have some good ideas? Can we make some of this happen on the newsstand and will it lift sales?

If you’re not a subscriber to the BoSacks newsletter, click on this link and sign up. It’s well worth your time.

 

Things Placed In Front Of The Magazine Rack: The Clerk Edition

So how does this deal sound?

• You’ll get a generous discount.
• We’ll give you Scan Based Trading so you don’t have any inventory to concern your accountants.
• We’ll pay you a Retail Display Allowance. Heck, we’ll make it “Advanced RDA”. Will that work for you?
• Your suppliers trucks will drop off new deliveries, merchandise the product and return those pesky unsolds that will never disgrace your accountants’ ledgers.
• Representatives of your suppliers will advise you on product mix, placement and keep you apprised of all the latest new launches, manage, market and sell your promotional programs.

Sounds good? Great! Thank you for being a magazine retailer! Now, where will you display our merchandise in your stores?

Oh, I don’t know. How about in the “dead” lane?

Lots of traffic here…

Jim Sturdivant, one of the founders of mediaShepherd sent me the above photo from his local drugstore. This is the aisle that leads to the cashier station. The swinging door in front of the rack is, as you can see, open. Clearly this does not invite the customer to browse the magazine rack.

Unfortunately, this is not an unusual scenario.

Not so inviting a space, is it?

Anyone who has traveled the country on behalf of magazine publishers, wholesalers or national distributors can regale you with tales of how they walked the aisles of a major national or regional retailer only to find the magazine rack located at the back corner of the store in a “dead” aisle. I’ve even seen the mainline placed on the exit aisle on the other side of the check outs (If you wanted to buy a magazine, you’d have to go back to the cashier to pay for it – or steal it).

A national chain store near my office has the magazine rack in the last aisle of the least busy section of the store. The magazines face the wall. It’s this way in at least four other stores I’ve visited in other parts of the country. This position is clearly something I take into consideration every time one of my clients wants to purchase their “Mainline Feature Pocket Program.” On the other hand, when I check sales in these stores, copies are being purchased. I know they aren’t being “stolen”. It’s an SBT chain.

So how do we fix this? We’re currently in a fight to maintain the space we have. How do we get a better position?

Editor’s Note: Please keep the flow of pictures coming. It’s great to see what is going on out in the world. They also don’t have to be of display disasters. Good stuff happens everyday.

A Bounty of Book A Zines

We’ve seen numerous reports of the remarkable growth of the Book A Zine category since the beginning of this no longer new decade. Most of the reports marvel at the tremendous elasticity of the category, the unit sales growth and the wide variety of titles that publishers are pumping out.

But unless you really go and look at a magazine rack today, you wouldn’t really see and feel the impact of what this “new” category is doing to the rack.* Oh you can talk about it and read all about it, but until you really go and look and see, you might not understand it.

As our former Secretary of Defense and eloquent wordsmith Donald Rumsfeld once said:

When there were more wholesalers to visit, distributions to work and territories to see, I always made it a point to spend a few hours at retail. Unlike some of the traveling pooh-bahs of the time, my goal wasn’t to find an issue to use as a cudgel on the local rep. I really wanted to see and know the town. It was the only way I felt that I could know, understand and own what I was working on. The only way to know what I knew and know that I didn’t know what I didn’t know.

If you know what I mean. Because otherwise it was just a bunch of numbers.

We don’t have that today. When was the last time someone other than the local merchandiser was in the Martin’s on Route 20 in South Bend, IN?

The other day I spent some time getting acquainted with a new supermarket in the wake of my neighborhood store closing. While I still go out to retail, these days I’m usually just looking for one or two client titles. It was good to really stop, look, absorb, and spend time at the rack. It’s a great way to learn a store.

And look how these “zines” have taken over the rack:

Who said “General Interest” is dead?

Cooking, cowboys…and ice fishing? Well, it is January, this is the Midwest.

Maybe there was nowhere else to drop the bridal mag?

While this part of the market is doing well, they can strain the distribution chain. If the store is part of chain that has “SBT” (Scan Based Trading), then the wholesaler owns that merchandise. These are annuals. Those are high cover prices and a long on sale. That’s a lot of inventory to own.

There are fewer turns on the rack unless the publisher is pumping out a bunch of ‘Zines. And while some publishers are (cough, cough) pumping out a ton of ‘zines, it’s not enough to replace the lost sales we see in the higher volume categories.

Lastly, not all magazine categories are naturals for these “Zines.” And, more importantly, there are some economic issues to be concerned with. Without some existing clout behind you, a brand that is well established and has a significant newsstand presence, these aren’t that cheap to produce nor are they that cheap to launch in the blind.

In the comments section of Dead Tree Edition’s post about Book A Zines, industry guru Bo Sacks wondered if we would get too greedy and kill the category. I’m inclined to think not. Unlike a regular frequency title, you don’t repeat a special edition if it doesn’t work. It’s just too costly. Unlike a monthly, you’re not going to leave it on life support because there’s no ad or subscriber revenue to prop it up.

Where will the category go? I don’t know. But it was nice to stop and look, really look at the rack.

*For the record, back in the day, we called them annuals or SIPS. There just weren’t as many of them, and they didn’t have good press.