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The Magazine Work for 1912

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Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Dec 21, 1911

FromReview and Herald, Vol. 88, No. 51.

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The Magazine Work for 1912

By E. R. P.

OUR record of magazine sales for the year 1911 is nearly completed. In many respects this has been a year of prosperity and blessing, although the gain in the circulation of our magazines is not so great as we had hoped for. However, there is no reason for discouragement.
As shown in the comparative summary, the circulation during the first eleven months of 1911 has passed the whole circulation of 1910 by nearly 65,000 copies. When we add the December record, the gain over the previous two years will be quite substantial and encouraging. However, we are far from satisfied with the present status.
This is an age of magazines. Many of the popular magazines in the United States have a circulation above a half-million copies a month. Several have passed the million mark, and the Saturday Evening Post and the Ladies' Home Journal are stretching away in the race toward two million copies a month. Our magazines are the best in the world. They carry the everlasting gospel in its final setting for this world. We believe that God has given us this method of circulating our literature as a means for reaching thousands and millions of people who are difficult to reach. Especially is this work with the magazines solving the proposition of reaching the masses in the great cities of this country.
The greatest difficulty we have met, thus far in launching this work, has been to organize it into a strong movement under the direction of competent leaders. We have already published the plans laid by the General Conference Committee at the recent autumn council for strengthening this work, and these plans have been explained by correspondence. The way is prepared for all to unite in an effort to place the sale of magazines upon the same sound, organized basis as our subscription-book work. This can be done promptly and thoroughly if all who carry responsibility will unite heartily in the effort. The following is a brief restatement of—

Plans and Suggestions

1. Beginning with Jan. 1, 1912, all our colporteur work will be managed as one work, whether the colporteurs sell subscription books, forty-per-cent books, helps, or periodicals.
2. The magazine work will be under the direction of the field agents of the local conferences and the general agents of the union conferences.
3. In large conferences where the work is too heavy for one field agent, it will doubtless be desirable for an assistant field agent to be appointed. Or if a field missionary secretary is already in charge of the magazine work, it may be thought best by some conferences to continue that arrangement.
4. The field agents will select the colporteurs, train them, and assign territory for magazines, the same as they do for subscription books.
5. The publishers of our ten-cent magazines will furnish to field agents a full list of the names and addresses of those who are selling magazines in their respective territories, including their records for the past few months.
6. The field agents will send out blanks for individual reports each week. A full report will be required from each colporteur for magazines the same as for books. Blanks for reporting are being changed so as to include the magazine work.
7. Beginning with the new year, all the colporteur work will be published in one summary in the REVIEW, the books and magazines appearing in separate columns, so that they may be computed separately the same as in the past.
8. In arranging for institutes during the winter and spring, we should plan to secure the attendance of as many colporteurs for magazines as possible. These workers have had little training and few advantages. We should endeavor to develop a strong force under definite leadership as rapidly as possible.
9. In organizing bands of colporteurs in our denominational schools, general agents and field agents should not overlook the students who should sell magazines, but make proper provision for their instruction, and work in the field.
10. Let us grasp the advantages of this forward movement, and develop its possibilities speedily into a blessed reality.
E. R. P.