Stop the presses! But not for long. We've still got 1,500 magazines to print, fold, staple, trim, address, sort, and mail.

What does it take to create a month's issue of Crown Jewels of the Wire magazine? My wife and co-editor, Linda, thought some of our readers would be interested in finding out. She says it is certainly a whole lot more work that she ever imagined. But she also admits she has to pry her fingers off the keyboard when time comes for her to leave for work at her nursing job. She's discovered a hidden talent, and an immense interest, in editing and publishing.

GATHERING DATA: Ideas! How do you measure how much time and effort goes into just thinking about what subscribers might want to view and read? We solicit articles everywhere we can. There are feature stories about famous telegraph and power lines, individual collectors, or certain types of insulators. There are show reports, advertisements, upcoming show listings. Decisions have to be made about cover ideas, color printing, selection of an insulator of the month, color inserts, and the selection of black and white photographs. Pictures are sometimes taken months in advance at shows or collectors homes for future use. I'd estimate that just the gathering of data takes 20 hours a month. Of course, much of that time is just plain fun. We visit collectors at their homes, attend shows, take pictures and exchange emails. 

PRE-PRODUCTION: This has become Linda's specialty. When she receives a photo for use in, say, a show report, it's off to (Adobe) Photoshop to set the resolution for printing, to edit, to crop, to convert from color to gray scale and to save in .tif format. Then, a second copy of the photo has to be stored in a separate file for presentation in color on the website. It has to be saved as a .jpeg picture in a RGB format. If a photo is to be printed in color it goes through the same process, but it needs to be converted from RGB color to CYMK color in a .tif format. It, too, will need a second picture saved as a .jpeg for the website file. Now repeat these steps some 90 times...as that's how many pictures, illustrations and graphics are used each month between advertisements, articles, color inserts and the cover.

Each page is built as its own work of art. The size needs to be precisely the same with a frame line, text boxes, and picture boxes.

Jeff Wolford, pressman, checking for 
quality at the press.

Text runarounds, special margins, and separate boxes have to be built for each photo. Each picture or graphic has to be sized to exactly fit the box. If it's too big, only a part of the picture will show when published. 

Text is generally written in Microsoft word and imported into Quark, the software used to create the magazine. Much of copy comes to us from contributing writers. That means importing data from PC's to our Macintosh computer, converting fonts and type sizes to standards used in the magazine. It's tedious work, demanding more patience than I often seem to have. Linda's great at it. She's very particular, and probably spends 80 hours per month on this part of the production. 

Jim Walstrom, 
owner of THE BULLETIN, 
prints Crown Jewels.

When the writing and page-building is over, it's proofread in Quark's spell check program.  But even spell checkers can create their own mistakes. If you have a space between digits in the year "20 03", the spell check program will tell you there's a problem with the "03". So you correct it on the spot, and the program goes on to the next word. But if you don't go back later and check, the published product will read "200303". A mistake like this seems to occur about once each month. We spend several hours a month proofreading, and still often find embarrassing mistakes when the magazine is printed. Our eyes just don't see things as well on a computer screen as the printed page. 

PUBLISHING: Actual publishing is a three part process. Color inserts are one printing, the cover is another, and the text is a third round of printing. Each needs it's own separate layout. It's more economical to print eight pages of color at a time, so we attempt to print up two months worth of inserts at once. It's the same story for the cover, which has to be printed separately because of the heavier paper stock. Last printed is the black and white text. We're new customers to our printer, and have to fit into his work schedule. Getting Crown Jewels out earlier in the month would be easier if we were the only customer, but we're not. Once the actual printing is over, the pages are placed in stacks; the magazines are hand assembled; hand stapled; and then individually trimmed to the right size. We make numerous trips to the printer: turning in the magazine on a CD, proofreading the color insert, the cover, and the text. And finally picking up the magazines. All those trips consume at least 4 hours per month. 

(Our son) David is a lifesaver. He helps us solve computer 
problems and enjoys working on graphic art projects. 
He also works occasionally at THE BULLETIN.

For the mailing process our dining room table expands 
big enough to seat a Thanksgiving dinner party of 10!

(Our daughter) Christa helps in our "mail room".

MAILING: Mailing the magazines is the last hurdle. Subscription renewals arrive every day. All month long renewals, new subscriptions, and address changes are added to the Access data base. We spend about 20 hours per month on the updates, as well as answering subscriber questions, re-sending magazines to make up for items lost or damaged in the mail, and answering inquiries from prospective customers. Also in preparation for the mailing, we print up over a hundred renewal notices that will be hand-stuffed into magazines where the subscriptions are about to expire. The notices take a couple of hours to print and stuff. Postage is applied to first class envelopes in advance of the mailing. It takes two hours just to apply the stamps. On the night before the magazines are due to come off the press, we print the address labels. That takes an hour itself. 

When the magazines arrive home, renewal notices are stuffed and magazines placed into the first class envelopes. We plan on three hours getting first class ready for the post office.

Jean Ballew, Postmaster
of the Merlin Post Office

Then comes the second class mailing, requiring the insertion of renewal notices where appropriate and the application of mailing labels directly on the magazines. Second class has to be sorted for delivery zones, and bundled for common zip codes. Next, the second class issues are placed in large mailing bags. Bags containing magazines with US addresses are shipped north to Portland, Oregon. Magazines with addresses to Canada and overseas head south to Oakland, California. 

Collectors who live on the East Coast often ask if we could mail their issues first, giving them an equal opportunity to receive Crown Jewels at the same time as collectors on the West Coast. However, postal regulations require that the entire Second Class mailing be delivered to the post office at one time.

Generally, first class goes out one day and second class the next. Which is better? First class delivery is obviously faster. Second class is less expensive for the subscriber. For us, there's less processing time for second class since we don't have to stuff those magazines into envelopes that also have to be stamped. For delivery to addresses in the United States, both first and second class delivery seems to work equally well. However, we'd recommend first class to Canadian addresses, as an unusually large number of magazines seem to go astray from the second class delivery to Canada. If you live overseas, second class delivery service is not available. 

ADVERTISING: Since taking over Crown Jewels, Linda and I have spent most of our focus on learning how to publish a magazine. We haven't yet put an emphasis on advertising. But we are going to need to, as subscription rates don't begin to pay for the publishing and mailing expenses of Crown Jewels.

If you are a potential advertiser, we'll let you in on a secret. Many of the collectors who have advertised individual insulators for sale since January have reported tremendous success. One collector sold over 90% of the insulators he advertised within three weeks. Right now, collectors are eager to buy insulators if they can find them for sale. At a mere $40 for a full page black and white advertisement, Crown Jewels can present your items to some 1,500 collectors. Searching for buyers? Call us today so we can place your ad as soon as possible. Phone 541-479-8348 or 541-660-8456. 

COLOR ADVERTISING: Linda and I are working to get as much color into Crown Jewels as possible. This month's issue is yet another experiment to make the magazine even more attractive by using a combination of publishing both articles and advertisements in color. 

If you want to use color to attract attention to your sales, or to your club's show, a single page in color plus an opposite page in black & white can be acquired as a package for $200. A single page of color by itself is available for $175. Or, the inside of the back cover in color, plus the opposite page in black and white, can be acquired for $250. Color advertising should be planned two months in advance. Call us! 

FEEDBACK: Finally, one of the most important things subscribers can do is to provide feedback. Please call, or write, or email. Thank you.