Aww. Thank you thank you thank you. & I'd like to thank... Oh, wait a minute, that speech is for the red carpet, isn't it? What would we do if any of us were nominated? What would we wear with our farmers' tans??? Tally, I really was briefly famous several years ago, when several hurricanes hit the south, & a tv reporter showed up on my office doorstep on Labor Day week-end. He was looking for a Realtor to interview about the effect of the hurricane remediation on the price of building materials. I'm pretty sure he came to me because I was the only one in the office on Labor Day week-end... My "interview" was about 4 seconds long, but it was exciting for me & my friends!

Here's more of the nuts-n-bolts of the project, I just hope my info helps anyone else out there wanting to get something done and realizing that the only way "its" gonna happen is to do it yourself. First of all, some background: I have worked as a commercial artist, illustrator, cartoonist for around 25 years. Though I make very little money as a book illustrator (projects pay less than the fee for writing), my graphic designs and commercial art publications have won numerous awards both national and statewide. Still, being a graphic artist isn't a goldmine. I currently work for a small scale publisher that produces those free press tabloid style papers you see in every medium to large sized city. I design ads all day long, Monday thru Fri. I also work for a high-end plant nursery on weekends. This is where I got the idea that a local publication focused on gardening would be the perfect home based business for me. I am very active here on Garden Web and organize local gardening events, tours and plant swaps. Even though I've only lived here for four years I love this area and its weather and the gardening potential. They refer to the size of any projects potential customer base as your 'universe'. My universe is huge. This area has over a million people and when you consider that 85% of the population considers themselves gardeners - that's a lot of potential newsletter readers. Within one hour you have 4 major botanic gardens, each with a completely different direction, and about 60 garden themed or "outdoor living" businesses. There is also a dynamic market scene involving plants at both the State run Farmer's Market and a city run Flea Market (combined = 34 year round vendors). The city paper has a decent gardening section every other saturday; their ad rates are outrageously high; they have around 12 year round ad contracts (all small sized ads) and during the spring can swell to almost 2 pages of ads each Saturday. The articles are about half from locals and half from syndicates. I started this whole thing thinking that if 5000 papers (32 pages, 4 pages of full color) cost me only 28 cents each, I could sell them for $1.50 - split it 50% with the vendors (which is a better deal for them than standard magazines), which would equal my postage costs for subscibers. In other words I would at least double my money no matter which way I sold the paper. I learned that you can sell 100 papers through one location in May and only sell 12 in June (spring is OVER!). I learned that the minimum order for webpress printing is 1000 pieces and only one printer would even do that (thank god he was down the street instead of across town). When you're starting out and working 7 days a week, it can be kinda hard to unload 1000 papers all by yourself. I learned that selling ads takes months upon months of rubbin elbows with the businesses - they just don't buy ads on the first visit. They also demand results, if your ad does't improve sales right away they will not be buying a repeat ad. They are exhausted by salespeople calling them every 10 minutes - no matter what you are offering, you are just one more voice taking up their time. If you can't get close to them first thing in the morning you won't be able to impress them (I'm at work at my real job first thing in the morning). Seeing as the average sales per store was more like 12 copies each month (outside of the few springtime months), I would need 200 locations to turn a profit and unload most of my product (assuming subscriptions would increase each month). I don't have this many locations. more bad news... Buying the minimum of 1000 pieces the price goes up to 98 cents per issue. Postage per item is $1.06 instead of the planned for 55 cents because I don't have the required 200 addresses to qualify for bulk rates. So, I'm losing money, lots of money each month. I also don't get many subscribers, the few that I get come from people I meet with face to face at gardening events. They tell me they love the newsletter but I feel that their purchase is more like charity - but at this point I need the money to bad to care. I think the garden centers will change their minds if I stay at it long enough. I think I need to quit my weekend job in order to market this project better. I also think that gardeners do a lot of planning and reading during the late winter and early spring - so my January/Feb/Mar issues will be colorful and feature last years successes and failures in the garden instead of just wintertime activities. The annoying parts - people don't hesitate to tell me about a typo. I get phone calls every month complaining about poor gramar or punctuation - even though the masthead states that I am wearing all the hats on this project for now. And I get plenty of people that want it for free.

Oh, Nonnie, I'm so sorry to hear you've been sick! I hope you're feeling a lot better now and that you have a full recovery. I completely understand how you solved the problem by "clicking on buttons." My computer problems usually stem from hitting the wrong button accidentally, and I don't know how it happened. When I'm lucky, I stumble on the "cure" by another happy accident. Good luck to you! Sue

I went out to BM and picked up Gray Owl as well as a few others. A new leading contender is Gray Sky. I will have to get a sample quart though as the colors are never what I expected once I get them on the wall. I realize that now your cabinets are not White Dove. I do remember that when Jason showed me your color it had a gray tinge to it which is perfect with you island. Blue Star is no longer in the corner (No one puts baby in the corner- Dirty Dancing remember that line?). It looks so great! Contractor said DO NOT COOK ON IT YET! He has insulation stuffed in the duct for the vent fan until the cover box arrives for outside. BUMMER!