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WIPP is a non-profit organization dedicated to empowering women in publishing and media. We support each other, develop leadership skills, balance professional and personal interests, and foster growth for independent career choices and publications by and for women.

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Bloggers on the Women’s Leadership Conference

photo by Jeanne Stack

If you missed the Women’s Leadership Conference in San Francisco, read what a couple of reporters had to say about the event for women in media and publishing.

Sarah Granger, SF Gate, City Brights

E.B.Boyd, Mediabistro.com, BayNewser on Dorothy Kalins and Michela O’Connor Abrams

More photos of the event by Jeanne Stack can be seen here.

Top 10 Reasons

Top 10 Reasons to Attend the WIPP Women’s Leadership Conference:

Finding Your Niche As We Shape the Media Revolution
January 29, 2010
8 a.m. to 5 p.m. (wine and chocolate tasting to follow)

1. Get inspired by Saveur founding editor, Dorothy Kalins, who is the 2009 recipient of the WIPP Exceptional Women in Publishing award.
2. Develop mad new media skills. Attend the workshops where you’ll learn how to use video and other new media tools in a comfortable, supportive environment.
3. Hear proven strategiesto grow your business. Learn how to use social networking sites and YouTube to build your audience and monetize your Web site.
4. Build lifelong relationships. Exchange ideas with other women in publishing and media–publishers, editors, strategists, new media experts, writers, graphic designers, printers, marketers, and distributors.
5. Learn what dazzles in the design world today. Get up-to-speed on the latest trends in magazine and Web design.
6. Get one-on-one speed coaching. Sit down with a qualified career or life coach and map your strategy for 2010.
7. Attend our panel discussion “Woman-to-Woman: The Alpha Female” where you’ll hear how to overcome the specific challenges that female leaders often face.
8. Discover how to boost your revenue. Print and Online: It’s the way of the future. Learn about the best money-making opportunities in both arenas.
9. Mingle over wine and chocolate. WIPP and WFMA invite you to a wine and chocolate tasting at Arclinea. You friends and colleagues are welcome–invite them for the Friday evening tastings!)
10. Enjoy beautiful (and temperate) San Francisco! The conference is just steps away from a world of shopping, renowned restaurants, scores of art galleries, and the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art.

For just a few more days to register for $199. WIPP member pay $179. Want to save even more? Grab a friend or colleague and take advantage of our Bring a Friend discount. Sign up together, and you’ll each get an additional 15 percent off!

To get the Bring a Friend discount, simply:
Hop over to the conference registration page.
Enter this discount code: FRI5ND2

FRIENDS OF WIPP – Conference Sponsors

Worldcolor

Brown Printing

RR Donnelley

Graphic Communications

Palm Coast Data

Publishers Press

WIPP Partners

ASJA

Mediabistro

PBAA

PINK magazine

SXSW

WFMA

In-Kind Sponsors

Marschall Design

Prepress, Inc.

A Celebration of Gourmet Magazine

At the order of its parent, Conde Nast, Gourmet ceased its publication in October 2009. However, after 70 years in of existence Gourmet has set the standard for high quality in food magazines. On January 19, 2009 Zócalo Public Square presents a celebration Gourmet’s success in building a strong and diverse brand with books, website, and television shows and garnering nearly one million subscribers.

Held in Los Angeles, CA,  attendees will include former Gourmet editors Ruth Reichl and Laurie Ochoa and former Gourmet writer Jonathan Gold. These great individuals will look back at the history of Gourmet, the culture it sparked,  and the future of the Gourmet brand and American food writing. Don’t miss this once-in a-lifetime event and register today!

FREE Class! – Get a Grip on Word Files

On January 11, 2010 desktop publishing connoisseur Ms. Bevi Chagnon takes some of the main concepts of her ‘508 + Word + PDF’ class and condenses them in the this short seminar held in Washington, DC.

Chagnon will show how to work smarter and faster with Word’s built-in tools. Enhance your computer skills and register today.

Video of wipp’s 2009 Leadership Conference

JANUARY 29, 2010

Thanks, Thea, for putting this jazzy video together from the photos of last year’s Women’s Leadership Conference. It gets me very excited for the upcoming conference for women in San Francisco. The video touches on how this event brings such great women gether sharing so many thoughtful ideas about publishing and media. If you are on the fence about coming to the January conference or not…Let me say, DO IT!  You will not regret it.

In this age of digital communications, it is truly a special treat for yourself to attend an event where you can feel the energy created at that spot. It is easy to sign up online. Bring a friend and save, enter code FRI5ND2, and enjoy a day for yourself.

Sweet or Sour Marketing?

A few weeks ago, I stood at a crowded corner of downtown San Francisco. Promoting  a new company, I distributed two items to working professionals passing me by one their way to work: a flyer detailing the company’s services and a piece of candy with the company logo written in dyed sugar.

Was this bit of “sugar on top” a great way to raise public awareness on this new business? First, let me share that the candy was anything but a treat. Putting money towards having candy fashioned with their company logo, this business created a sweet that looked like a large aspirin pill and tasted like the real drug. Even the employees found it unedible.

At the time, I couldn’t help but see this as a negative marketing tactic. Of course the company itself deserved much adulation for its services and hadn’t intentionally created bad candy. What do the members at WIPP think? Was this marketing tactic good or bad?

Good News About Magazines

Itching for some good news about the magazine industry? We’ve got you covered.

A New Period

Women in Periodical Publishing is a mouthful. The decision by the board to create our first new image in eleven years was preceded by many discussions about our name and who we are. Is periodical relevant? What does it mean to publish and how does a professional get that way?  This organizational soul-searching is likely to continue, so we went ahead, kept our long name and gained a more complete graphic identity to express the depth and diversity that is behind it. Women in periodical publishing is a mouthful, but a name is only one of the tools we use. We hope our new look still says something about our work and our mission. Join wipp, and together we will lead an industry organization and an industry into another decade.

Look for our mark online

Just like you, wipp will make statements periodically, support those who publish regularly and always encourage other women to speak, write, edit, illustrate, design, proof, print, distribute, market, read, lead, and to do those things often.

We give thanks for the fine work on our new look to super designer, Dorothy Marschall of Marschall Design.

Reading for Teens

What are teens reading these days? In the October 26, 2009 issue of Publishers Weekly, the cover story “What Do Teens Want?” explores what kinds of books draw teens away from watching MTV and reality shows. Here’s an interesting look at the growth in the teen book category. However, I couldn’t help but wonder about magazine/periodical publishing.

Getting teens to read is a chore and congratulations to any parent whose teenager reads for pleasure. My own mum once told me, “When you were in high school, you could have been interested in reading anything and I would have encouraged it. So long as you were reading, it was fine.” 

I’m curious as to what my fellow members at WIPP think. Do you think magazine/periodical reading should have been addressed in this article? Do you think parents should be happy that their kids can’t wait for the latest issue of Seventeen or Rolling Stone to hit stands? Most of all, would you call a teenager a reader even if the pages he/she turns are glossy and illustrated?

You can read the article by clicking here.