Back around the first of the year, my significant other and I decided to spend a rare evening to ourselves going out to dinner at Station 7 Restaurant in Pittsville. Since we had a little bit of a wait, Kim picked up a newspaper which happened to feature some friends of ours on the cover.
What we happened upon was the first rendition of a new monthly magazine that delves into the local art and music scene. It may seem apt, given our trying economic times, that the edition was dubbed The Hard Times Magazine, but co-founder Katie Jacobson explained the notion behind the name in a recent interview.
“The Hard Times was born out of hard times, but we also chose the name for it’s double meaning. We think it reflects the edginess of the paper more than a time of desperation. If you read it, it’s really not about the economy. Also, even if the economy does make a rebound, the idea of ‘hard times’ is something that everyone can still relate to, at some point.”
Continued Katie, “The other reason we chose the name is because we didn’t want to be strictly a tourist rag, or simply a paper for local news. There are dozens of papers out that build their model around being a beach magazine. We didn’t want to choose a title with beach, shore, ocean, surf, or anything else in it that might imply that were another BeachComber. Not that there’s anything wrong with those other papers, just that they already exist and we didn’t feel like there was room for another one.”
Obviously there’s room for The Hard Times. That first edition, which debuted December 1 with a 10,000 copy run, had its cost and overhead expenses covered by advertisers before the paper hit one of its many distribution points running from Salisbury east to Ocean City. That number of outlets has grown to over 100, and next up for the duo of Jacobson and co-founder Jeremy Bohall is promoting the paper to the Ocean City summer market and making a push northward into Delaware. They predict circulation will run between 150,000 and 200,000 copies in 2011, and a goal is to begin selling subscriptions later this year. Meanwhile, the associated Hard Times website has grown to a point where it attracts upwards of 300 unique visitors a day.
From the humble beginnings of spending most of November going door-to-door selling ads, Katie revealed that now the advertisers are coming to them. Still, they want to keep the operation small. “A lot of other newspapers are struggling to pay a mortgage and a staff of people…(operating small) allows us to be less expensive than anyone else.”
When pressed to describe the magazine, Jacobson said, “we are really like a hybrid between a City Paper and Maxim Magazine, without the half-naked women.” Their most recent March issue has a feature on a ‘crabby old fart’ (look it up,) local rockers The Phantom Limbs, a profile of local artist Nate Britko, and a “brew review,” among other items. “Our goal is to entertain first and inform second,” she added.
Yet another Hard Times distinction is their website. Unlike most print media, which uses their website as an adjunct to the print edition, their publication uses the print edition as a teaser for the website, which is chock full of additional multimedia content based on features from the print edition.
“We produce original video content to go with many of our stories, and we try to write about things that others don’t,” said Jacobson. “In the future you will see smart phone aps, and even some flash games added to the website. Even if you read the print version there is always a reason to also visit the website.” So if you want to see some video of their featured musical artist, it’s right there on the site, along with additional pictures from their featured artist, links to their websites, and other content print simply can’t provide.
With all that occurring over the space of just a few short months, it was no wonder that Hard Times sponsored a “Release Party” earlier this month at JC’s Northside Pub in Ocean City. (Of course, JC’s is one of their key sponsors.)
So I asked Katie: why a party now, several months in?
“We just hope to get the name out there…the more people who read our publication, the better for our advertisers,” said Jacobson. Nor will this party be the last.
“We will be sponsoring Rods and Rockers at the Steer Inn over Car Show weekend (and) plan to sponsor at least one art show and one music event over the summer,” Katie told me. “We are always thinking of new fun stuff that we could do to help promote not only the magazine but all the great businesses that have supported us! I would think of it as an additional draw for our sponsors as well, people working with us can benefit from the promotion of these events.”
And that synergy between advertisers, sponsors, and featured performers extended to the entertainment and even the charitable cause at their Release Party.
The Kaleb Brown Reggae Band (above) made an appearance in the January edition as featured musicians, while Michele and Jim Hogsett (below) represented December’s featured musicians, Semiblind.
And, ever the resourceful group, you can see that Hard Times was recording the musical segments for future use – the video camera is being manned by the gentleman in black just left of the center of the picture. People were having a good time.
There was a charitable element as well, again tied to the magazine. Its February cover features Eva Paxton of the Salisbury Roller Girls, who were featured in the January issue. Eva made the cover in February, her bald head – the result of her chemotherapy – providing a contrast to the posture of strength she was assuming. Between the preparation of the piece for the January issue and its actual publication Eva was diagnosed with non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma; thus the 50-50 raffle Eva particpated in at the Release Party was to benefit the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society.
All in all, one thing seems certain: Bohall and Jacobson seem quite willing to put in the time and effort needed to make this magazine a go. It straddles a fine line between alternative and mainstream, with the true test of that balance being how it will be accepted over the summer by Ocean City tourists. Hopefully The Hard Times will provide a service to those throngs by introducing them to what makes our area unique.
Katie closed her note to me by wanting to thank those who made The Hard Times possible.
“I would also like to make sure I mention that we could never have done this without the overwhelming support of our readers. We have picked up 3 or 4 interns, and 5 or 6 writers who discovered our paper and just wanted to help and be a part of it. We have also received support from several local businesses like Jeffrey Auxer Design, Chauncey’s, Bungalow Love, DePietros Pizza, The Berlin Coffee House, Furious Fitness, Little Chico and Black Cobra Tattoo, and a bunch of other people who were good enough to take a chance on us when we really didn’t have a lot to show them. We really are very grateful to everyone!”
And those of us who enjoy all the things which make our little corner of the world unique would like to thank Katie Jacobson and Jeremy Bohall for bringing these bands, artists, and all else that makes this place so great to our attention. Hopefully The Hard Times will let us in on the good times we can have if we just get a little bit out of our comfort zone.
