Report of the MCAA Publication Committee

Several critical areas have lead to the continued resurgence of the magazine.

1. Editorial content has steadily improved which undoubtedly has increased the value to the readership giving a subscription to Masonry increased worth.

2. Increased advertising sales have strengthened the financial position of the magazine. A stronger advertising base has also allowed the magazine to improve the caliber of the publication with an expanded use of four colors throughout the magazine.

3. Overall quality and member involvement has certainly made it easier to gain both subscriptions and advertisements. An improved quality product has made it easier for advertisers to justify the investment of their advertising dollars in the magazine, and a radically improved media kit has successfully expressed the new quality of the magazine to our potential customers.

Masonry Magazine will continue to work toward improving its usefulness to both the MCAA and the masonry industry. We have outlined another strong editorial calendar which has been included for your review in your packet of information. In addition, we have begun to identify strong new advertising prospects for our magazine. These prospects are those industry suppliers who advertise in our competitor's magazine, Masonry Construction, and not in our magazine.

One of the committee's long-range goals is to have a strong enough subscription base to compete equally with Masonry Construction Magazine. We intend to accomplish this goal, in part, by asking the assistance of the MCAA's Regional Vice Presidents to research subscription opportunities in their regions, primarily with those chapters that send subscriptions of the competitor's magazine to industry customers and prospective members. With the improved quality of our magazine, we should now be able to benefit from the sale of bulk subscriptions to our magazine, instead of our competitor's magazine, by our chapters.

Another method which the committee is investigating to accomplish our goal of competing on an equal basis with Masonry Construction Magazine is to send a complementary one year subscription of Masonry Magazine to the association's list of all potential mason contractor members, which numbers approximately 7,000. We believe that the MCAA's investment for sending a one-year's complementary subscription to this list will benefit the association in the following ways:

1. We will be able to promote the increased circulation of our magazine to our current and potential advertisers which should allow us to justify a moderate increase to our advertising rates and should also result in an increase to our advertising sales. This increased revenue should totally off-set the cost of sending a free subscription to the MCAA's list of mason contractors. We are estimating that the increase to the total cost per issue should amount to approximately $3,000, the bulk of which is for postage.
2. During the year that the complementary subscription is in effect, it will be the association's objective to convert as many of the complimentary subscriptions to a paid subscriptions or, ideally, to convert a subscriber into an association member. Either way, subscription revenue, membership revenue and convention revenue will increase due to the increased exposure to the MCAA through Masonry Magazine.
3. An intangible benefit is that with a larger base of contractor readers, the MCAA will have an expanded forum to promote their position on industry issues and to disseminate information about those issues that the association considers to be important.

We will present to the MCAA Executive Committee a more detailed proposal to implement this program and we are hopeful that it will be accepted.

Finally, I would like to suggest a restructuring of the Publication Committee to ensure the continued success of the magazine. I would like the committee to be comprised of five members including the chairman. These committee members shall be appointed by the Regional Vice Presidents as follows: Region A shall appoint one member to represent the Eastern States; Region B shall appoint one member to represent the Southern States; Regions C, D, and E shall appoint one member to represent the Midwestern States; Regions F and G shall appoint one member to represent the Southwestern States; and Regions H and I shall appoint one member to represent the Western States. In this way, the committee will have a greater ability to address issues that will have greater relevance to the readership as a whole and will further facilitate our ability to recruit subscribers and advertisers in different parts of the country.

I have remained as chairman of the Publication Committee until a successor is named and I would like this to occur by no later than next year's annual convention. If my proposed committee structure is approved, I am certain that we will have five viable candidates for chairmanship of the committee. I will address this issue with the MCAA Executive Committee after this meeting.

This concludes my report.