Money doesn't grow on trees...

23 February, 2010 - 22:27 by Mag1

How much is it fair to spend on a church magazine? Do they always HAVE to lose money? Why can’t we at least hold a coffee morning to raise some cash? My vicar wants me to run this thing on thin air. :-(

How can we collect magazine subscriptions simply and efficiently? ›
Submitted by Scribbler on 7 March, 2010 - 20:36.
We are a team parish so cost id divided amongst the 4 churches. We recently went over to professionally printed and was quoted 45p for 170 copies. I put the magazine cost up to 50p but first asked the PCC and got a unanimous go for it. The feeling was we should project a good image, good quality magazine. Where esle can you get a magazine for 50p?
Submitted by CNB on 17 March, 2010 - 13:34.
Where do you get your magazine printed and is it in colour for that ?. I am currently trying to sort out the cost of ours as advertisers have dropped off this year but I was quoted over £1.50 per copy for professional printing of A5 colour magazine with a monthly print run of 300 copies.
Submitted by Mikael on 13 September, 2011 - 16:34.
We decided that our magazine is such a great missionary tool that it should be FREE to all. It only has one advert each month, and is rota-free. It's A4 in size (folded A3), with eight A4 pages in all.
Submitted by parishlink@hotm... on 10 March, 2010 - 12:21.
Many editors face the dilemma of whether or not to carry advertising. As long as commercial advertising represents only a relatively small part of the magazine and, ideally, is constrained to one dedicated section, the funds raised are extremely helpful in producing a church magazine of high physical quality. I edit a parish magazine, the local advertisers are extremely loyal (there's a long waiting list) and we raise over £4,000 per year that way - which means our 1,500 print run every month is maintained as a free service to the local community (i.e., no cover price). A copy is delivered to every home across three villages, so it is a wonderful vehicle for Christian outreach.
Submitted by Freds on 17 March, 2010 - 17:31.
We print approx 300 magazines, A5 booklets, 28 pages - 3 of which are 'paid for' advertising. Every 2 years we get a bound edition made of the 24 issues (£20). The printing, collating, folding and stapling are done 'in-house' on the church B&W photocopier. Cover price is 50p or £5 per year. We distribute approximately 20 Comp copies (hotels, motorway service station, care homes etc) per month. We pay cost price for the photocoping - including depreciation of the photocopier. We do not accept advertising from 'just anybody' - we recently declined one for a Yoga club - but within reason advertising is a welcome source of revenue. Advertisers pay a small supplement if they want their advert in the 'Web Edition' of the magazine. Over the year - we make a profit. The Treasurer loves us!!! We used to pay to have the magazine printed outside the church. We then made a small loss. This way the financial situation is better, and deadlines are not so tight, BUT it does make work for a small group of volunteers who 'print and finish' the magazines each month.
Submitted by Richard Young on 17 March, 2010 - 20:30.
Our magazine doesn't use any advertising and a lot of the congergation are pleased with that. We print 130 copies a month with 16 pages. We'd like to go to a colour cover but that would mean putting the price up from 25p to 50p and the P.C.C. don't want to do that, even though most of the people I've spoken to in the congergation would be willing to pay extra for a colour cover. Is there anything I can suggest that would change their mind?
Submitted by Focus Editor on 19 March, 2010 - 18:42.
Suggest you mention the extra money (profit) which will go towards the parish share? Other than that you may want to petition the congregation? Bit of lively debate might go to help your cause. Go round other Parish churches and buy up copies to prove the point that way? 25p is very very cheap.
Submitted by Richard Young on 12 July, 2012 - 11:43.
Thanks. I'll consider that tonight at the meeting.
Submitted by Holy Rood Swinton on 29 March, 2010 - 13:35.
First of all is the magazine published for the PCC or your customers? If the former, then there's not a lot you can do as it's very much their magazine. If the latter, then gather your evidence, tell the PCC it's what the CUSTOMER wants, remind them it's not a PCC magazine and go for it always bearing in mind that although people will say yes if they think it's a good idea, it may prove more difficult to get increased amount of money from them once published. One way around this of course would be to get the additional money up front on the promise of a colour edition. Good luck Holy Rood Swinton
Submitted by Richard Young on 12 July, 2012 - 11:43.
Good advice. I'll put that forward.
Submitted by Old Salian on 5 September, 2012 - 16:26.
Our PCC have recently approved a price increase from 25p to 50p. 25p is definitely very cheap for a magazine bearing in mind rising costs etc. We do have some revenue from advertisers although this had tailed off slightly last year, it has increased this year as more advertisers have adopted a full page layout. I have received very few complaints (probably only 1 actually) about the cost increase. I offset this against a slight rise in number of pages (some issues have 40 pages) and use this as a justification for the price increase. I have had more compliments than criticism since taking over as Editor so for most I believe price isn't really an issue.
Submitted by Werburga on 18 March, 2010 - 00:06.
Without the revenue from advertising, we would have to increase the cost of the magazine from the current 30p per copy. We use professional printers to produce 830 copies of the 64 page B&W mag, they also collate & staple. Some people do not like the number of adverts we run but many others appreciate the source of local businesses it provides. I like the idea (submitted by Keith Milmer - above) of distributing a free magazine to every parishioner, but as we are a benefice of 5 rural villages with houses spread over great distances, the logistics of delivering to everyone is somewhat daunting. We are currently making a profit of over £2,000 per annum, which is used for projects within the benefice as it almost impossible to work out a fair way of sharing it out amongst our 5 churches.
Submitted by Figaro on 20 March, 2010 - 10:58.
We have a print run of 450 copies each month. The magazine is 24 X A5 pages of which about half are advertising. We raise about £1500 from advertisers each year which covers the annual rent and costs of our office machinery - a Duplo machine, Sharp photocopier and computer. The computer is connected to the Duplo so we print directly to that and run off all our magazine that way. It takes a couple of hours to do the print run. Then we have two couples who take it in turn to collate and staple each month. Another couple distribute the magazine to the distribution team (about 25 people) who then deliver it to the subscribers around the village. Subscribers pay £5 for the year. The magazine is self-financing but it doesn't make a profit! We regard it as our way of communicating with parishioners and "spreading the word". About half of the copies go to households who are not church attenders or are from other denominations.
Submitted by Mr Robert Coombs on 2 June, 2010 - 16:01.
2 June 2010 Here at Bishop's Hull we produce a Parish Magazine once a month. It's A5 format - the cover, 4 pages, then 36 pages of news etc and 16 pages of advertisements which appear half at the beginning and half at the end of the magazine. The whole magazine is photocopied commercially except for the cover which the editor produces in colour on his printer at home using mainly colour photos of village views. The magazine is put together by the editor and his wife then delivered by a group of volunteers. 200 copies are produced each month and are sold at 50p per copy. 170 copies are delivered locally and the balance sold in the local shop or in the church. Photocopying cost approximately £140 a month (£1680 p.a.). Producing the covers on 90gsm paper and using refilled cartridges, another £30 for paper and £150 for ink per annum. There are always other bits and bobs to buy so an overall total print cost would be approximately £1900 for the year. Advertising - most months all pages are full on a pre pay for a year basis (£84 for a full page) bringing in around £1260 p..a. and magazine sales £1110 - totaling £2370. To photocopy the covers commercially we were advised this would be an additional £100 a month so we decided to do it ourselves. The magazine funds provided money to update the editor's computer and also to provide the advertising/treasurer with a small home photocopier. The whole financial operation is run separately from church funds. To save space here describing content please visit: www.bishopshull.org.uk to view the parish magazine.
Submitted by New ed. on 5 June, 2010 - 09:14.
Fascinating to see how others make use of the same material offered by PP. Thanks for sharing your magazine on-line. Perhaps this could develop, though ours is less impressive.
Submitted by Ms Sara L Pass on 4 July, 2010 - 21:19.
Our humble 16 pages a month magazine contains no advertising at all - who would pay to advertise to a circulation of less than 20 pensioners, mostly in their eighties? We have charged 20p a month for years and no one ever suggests it is time for a price rise. The church stands the costs. I do have a colour printer - I bought it but I charge the church for ink and paper. I only use colour for the article names and the magazine name on the front cover, and I buy cheap paper from a commercial supplier - after all the magazine is going to end up in the recycling, so why use expensive paper - and the costs are therefore very reasonable. I'm the treasurer too. I'm very mean and stingy when it comes to spending money.
Submitted by Arthur Watts on 9 September, 2010 - 05:57.
FROM ASHBOURNE METHODIST CIRCUIT Has anyone experience of circulating an electronic, say PDF version, of their Church Magazine to those choosing to receive the magazine in this way rather than in a printed format? We currently produce 300 printed copies per month and make no charge for it.It also appears on our church website although not in colour. Clearly there would be cost savings in reducing the print run plus the environmental benefits of less paper. The other advantage is one could make greater use of colour in the electronic version at no cost at all. Reaction, experiences welcome.
Submitted by redglen on 23 September, 2010 - 14:51.
Re Arthur Watts post: I distribute our magazine in PDF attachement to a small email list of people who have moved away, have an interest in our church and our missionaries. I produce the magazine on Publisher then convert to PDF using CutePDFWriter (available as a free download online). Using PDF will preserve your formating and prevent people making changes to the magazine. I just put a note alongside the deadline date in the magazine to let people know the e-version is available. I do find people who attend the church prefer a 'hard' copy, even if they also receive it via email, however it has been very successful with those living away and our missionaries in particular have said how much they appreciate it. I believe some people in the church send a hard copy via post to some people, however that is their arrangement and I do not maintain a postal list. On the financial note - our magazine doesn't carry advertising and it is provided free. I only print one copy for proof reading and email it via PDF file to be printed. It is printed by another local church with a shinny new photocopier at a very reasonable rate, and our church pays for the printing - we only print 100 copies of a (normally) 16 A4 page magazine. I pay the Parish Pump subscription and view it as part of my support for my church.
Submitted by Jackie Grebby on 11 January, 2011 - 18:48.
We print 555 copies of A4 with 40 to 44 pages plus cover. The cover price is currently 75p but we sell annual subscriptions for £7.50. When the interest rate was higher this was very useful. All but about 30 copies are via annual subscription. The magazine is photocopied by a company specialising in photocopying parish magazines and costs 90p per issue to print. This would look like we should be losing money but This year we had £4,000 profit. Throughout the magazine we carry advertising - usually on a 6 or 12-month basis. We don't charge a lot - it works out at £39 pa for a 1/12th page.
Submitted by Clive Billenness on 17 September, 2011 - 21:08.
We do accept small ads and part/whole pages but we price it so that we get one free page of text for each page of advertising. This approach enables us to give the magazine away free to all parishioners, which in turn makes it very attractive to all advertisers to be able to reach 650 households 6 times a year for a relatively small investment (as little as £15 for a small ad). We do vet the adverts to ensure that they are suitable, and our readers appreciate the information about local plumbers, electricians, hairdressers, florists and chiropodists. We, too, use an excellent local printer who accepts copy via the internet and this helps us to keep the price down. The PCC do not feel that the magazine costs are a 'loss' but rather an 'investment' to enable us to reach every household in the Parish at least 6 times a year.
Submitted by Horsmonden Pari... on 6 November, 2012 - 13:36.
Some years ago we surveyed our readers of Parish News. We wanted to find out who our readers were and what they read. We were staggered. Nearly 80% of readers had little or no connection with any church in the villlage, few read the 'religious' articles, but did read village news etc. It meant we changed our style 'overnight'. Out went Christian language, ie Eucharist, Sacrement etc and also Theologicial articles that were likely to 'fly over the heads' of our readers. And in came in simple but true messages such as 'God loves you' and 'Jesus died for you because he cares'. We also tried to include straightforward stories of local people who have found faith and what it has meant to them. The change wasn't easy, we had been entrenched in the belief that all our readers were Christian, and wrote accordingly. But the effort has been worthwhile. Gradually these simple messages began to be translated into events within the community. Social mornings, Parish lunches, Village Breakfasts etc. The survey was probably the best thing that our Parish News ever did. Incidentally we haven't changed the price (50p) for nearly 10 years during which time we have adopted colour covers and upgraded the quality of print.
Submitted by John Hincks on 6 November, 2012 - 18:36.
I agree entirely with your comments. Most subscribers (£5 per year, 11 copies) think of it as a donation towards the upkeep of the church which they might want one day. We have not surveyed our readers but from the occasional comment it seems little of the inside is read or noted, except by some of the older people who attended services in the past. One problem we do have is a declining list of subscribers year on year. I suspect we are not alone in that our 'flock' is getting older and it is hard to convince new residents to support the church by subscribing, let alone attending services. Recently we have appointed a new young female vicar and hope she will reverse the trend.
Submitted by bowers-gifford on 13 November, 2012 - 14:57.
We are in the same position as John, our print run is 45 A5 booklets containing 24 pages 12 issues a year at 50p or £6 per year. All printing and collating is done on my colour printer, I source patent cartridges from internet sources to minimise print costs and most of the costs I donate as gift aid. Two years ago I set up subscription options and prepared a form which is sent out in Nov/Dec stating the minimum costs and advising that any profits are put into church funds, I also set out options for gift aiding and donating. With careful wording on the forms the response generally generates donations above the minimum costs. This method helped turn our loss making publication into a reasonable profit. However as John mentioned many of our donators and readers are in advanced age and it is a challenge to maintain the subscription numbers by getting younger parishioners to read. Producing a magazine every month single handed with just a few contributers is often a burden but every so often someone says they enjoyed an article and it makes it worthwhile, certainly couldn't do it without the PP's content.