The Summary by A. J. S. B.

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Washington, D. C. · Nov 24, 1910

The Summary

By A. J. S. B.

Question: “To what extent am I responsible for the loss or gain in my union conference?”

The comparative summary shows that during the first ten months of 1910, 234,200 more magazines were sold than during the corresponding months of 1909.

The figures credited to each conference represent the number of magazines sold by agents. They do not include the copies received by subscribers residing in those territories.

The average monthly sale of magazines during the first ten months of this year has been 150,126, as compared with 126,706 a month during the corresponding period of 1909; that is to say, a monthly gain of 23,420 copies over last year.

Our agents sold 85,897 of the 120,020 magazines circulated during September, and 79,940 of the 116,157 copies sold during October. Thus 5,957 less magazines were handled by the agents than during September. As a partial compensation for this, a gain of 2,094 is shown over September in the number of copies mailed to subscribers at home and abroad.

Although our four publishing houses shared about equally the loss represented by 3,863 less sales than during September, a renewed interest is apparent in this work throughout the field. Brother D. W. Reavis, manager of the Review and Herald Periodical Department, accompanies his October report of magazine sales with the following cheering words: “While our sales during October were not so large as during the summer months, when the students were largely engaged in this work, we appreciate the visible evidences of continued interest on the part of our regular workers, and also the increase of new workers. About one third of the orders for the November number that have come to us are from new workers, and over one half of the orders from our regular agents show an increase over their October orders. This is a very encouraging feature of our work at the present time.”

Following is a list of the union conferences showing gains: (1) Columbia Union, 3,056; (2) Northern Union, 1,860; (3) Southeastern Union, 1,669; (4) Southwestern Union, 1,258; (5) Western Canadian Union, 681; (6) Canadian Union, 580. The following union conferences show losses: (7) Southern Union, 541; (8) Pacific Union, 846; (9) North Pacific Union, 1,195; (10) Lake Union, 3,272; (11) Central Union, 3,590; (12) Atlantic Union, 5,627.

Thus far during the year 881,367 copies of the five ten-cent magazines issued by the Review and Herald Publishing Association have been sold,—an average of 88,136 copies a month. According to figures submitted by the manager of the periodical department, the association’s total magazine sales for six years have amounted to 3,371,500 copies, representing a value of $337,150. If to these be added the other periodicals issued, we have a grand total of over 15,500,000 copies of periodicals sold by this firm during the past six years. These represent a valuation of nearly $950,000. This year-by-year report will be published in a future issue. It is most interesting and profitable.

A. J. S. B.