I saw a commercial about these “Amish built” fireplaces on tv…

There is no way the Amish built these. Here’s what probably happened: An Amish guy built and designed the wooden frame box that this furnace thing slipped into, but the ones that these people are selling are electric. Yeah, they use that thing the Amish don’t use – electricity. Call me dumb. Call me ignorant. Just don’t call me a Mojave Mustang or a Boron Bobcat, okay? But I think this company is using (and abusing) the fine Amish name and reputation for craftsmanship to sell goods. Isn’t that just kinda lame?

….AND NOW FOR SOMETHING COMPLETELY DIFFERENT.

Remember how I mentioned I would share some notes soon? This is that blog. Don’t read unless you have a few minutes, cuz it’s a mouthful.

Enjoy.

Drink Pepsi.

…or Coke Zero.

You can’t argue with me, because God told me so!
Okay, that is a lame thing to say. Just for the record: I did not say that! I was just kidding. I could be all wrong about this. These are just some notes I took and some ideas I want to share.

Last December I had to face the facts that HM Magazine wasn’t doing too well as a business. I knew I needed to seek God’s face and find out if this was the end of a (then) 24.5 year journey. Like I said, I could certainly miss God and it’s tempting to imagine God blessing what you’re doing, but to the best of my ability I think this magazine should keep going on. In my 6-8 pages of notes I took during this time, here are some thoughts:

I’ve been equipped with the tools to do this, but I need to use them wisely.

I kind of sense a direction towards the church. Out of all the tweaking and points I came away with from this time of prayer, etc, this is the one area where I’ve probably actually done the least. I don’t want to make the mistake of placing the church (His body) above God (the Head of the body). In other words, I could turn all passive and beg and plead certain church leaders for help and conclude (if they didn’t help) that God Himself was rejecting my pleas. That would be an error in my opinion. So, it’s a fine line of knowing what to do.

There is also some legitimate structure and self-imposed as well as blessed (and probably ordained) gatekeepers. Some people have certain data (like names and addresses of churches, broken down into denominations, spending/giving habits, etc) that they make money from. They don’t give this information away (and I don’t necessarily think they should have to), but instead sell mailing lists (on average) at $85 “per thousand,” which is a simple mathematical factor. If you want to mail a postcard to 10,000 churches, you will pay $850 ($85 x 10). The people that have done the homework, such as building relationships with these churches, gathered their mailing info (email, too) and/or invited them to an event they put on; and therefore they deserve to be rewarded for that work. Therefore, when a Christian “para-church” organization puts on an event that lots of churches attend, I need to expect to pay something to present my product to those people gathered. It’s simple to understand. It’s not really crooked, either. Since I don’t have access to enough funds for this type of promotion to the church, I have done very little marketing to churches thus far.

What I believe, though, is that HM Magazine (because of its nature, identity and content) is a good resource for church workers (specifically youth workers), as well as Christian teenagers themselves. I don’t call HM a “resource,” per se, because it’s not really written to assist youth pastors or parents in serving, instructing, edifying and helping “their” kids. But, by de facto of its substance, it is a resource. I hope I can somehow communicate this to lots and lots of churches and church people.

One axiom I believe is that “your gift makes a way for you.” If you are a great drummer, bass player or whatever, you don’t have to tell everyone how good you are. If you simply do what you do, people will notice. Word will spread. Granted, at a certain point or level, having someone else “toot your horn” or “take you to the next level” can certainly help. But I believe and hope that as HM grows or continues to offer great content, that people will talk. That it will naturally grow and a good reputation will evolve. One thing I’ve tried to do is keep my nose to the grindstone and keep writing and presenting good content. This is one reason why I try to stay up-to-date with news on our website. I want hmmag.com to be a resource or a meeting place that people can come (and come to expect) news on Christian hard music on a regular basis.

One thought I had about that is sharing (speaking) to various church groups. I have spoken at churches, youth groups and Christian colleges from time to time. If I could do this more often (not a crazy frequency, like a few times a month, but more often than the once or twice every six months that I’ve been doing it … then perhaps HM Magazine (and the knowledge of its existence) could grow. You know how when a speaker or artist comes to a church? People usually buy a few of his/her/their books or CDs, etc. I could perhaps sell magazines and subscriptions if I spoke at more church groups.

If you know of an opportunity to speak (like at your church or you know something related), please let me know. I can speak on any subject (within reason), but I am probably especially equipped to speak from my experience (the pastoral gift of Christian rock, defining “Christian journalism,” the nuts and bolts and reality of Christian music as a ministry/business, helping artists grow in their vocation, writing).

Here are some other comments or questions that I have:

What hesitation, if any, would or do you have about HM Magazine as a resource for young people? This is a good question for youth pastors, youth workers, pastors and parents. If there is no valid or reasonable hesitation, then perhaps HM Magazine could be supported. And by “support” I simply mean subscribing. If HM Magazine is working properly, then it should be self-sustainable. At least that’s what I think. With the drying up of advertising sales the last few years, though, and our consistently high (though we’ve cut costs a lot) printing bills, I’m not sure if this assumption is safe to make. Maybe HM Magazine does need to be supported like a missionary or ministry. I don’t know. That’s not what I’m looking for, but maybe that’s a valid point or question worth delving into.

Why does a booth at the Youth Specialties convention get ignored? Granted, we don’t get sneers or malicious feedback, but we don’t come away with more than a dozen or two subscriptions. With hundreds and thousands in attendance, 24 or less subscriptions (if that’s our main offering) is not a good result. It’s possible that the people running the booth (yours truly) are not good convention booth/sales people. A certain personality does do best in a context like this. I think that does have something to do with it … and I am about to purchase a new booth banner/stand apparatus. If designed right, it will give us a better presentation. But I think we are also missing something when it comes to equipping youth workers. Many youth workers probably know what HM Magazine is, but I’d think that we’d have a lot more “support” from youth workers in a normal world than we do now. Something is missing. I’m not sure what it is. Perhaps we’re not presenting the right message to them. Perhaps we’re not reaching them at all. Maybe the bands that get their attention could hype HM Magazine a tiny bit? Maybe a band could wear an HM shirt in a public place (I think of the resurgence of popularity of Austin artist Daniel Johnston when Kurt Cobain wore one of his shirts on Nirvana’s MTV Unplugged performance. Granted, that was a big stage and that reached a ton of people, but it was a small, almost insignificant act that did that. Cobain wore a shirt that was cool looking … and people noticed. The singer for Pillar Rob Beckley wore one of our “Allen” shirts on one of their bonus video performances several years ago. Tourniquet drummer Ted Kirkpatrick wore one of our logo shirts (way back in the Heaven’s Metal Magazine days) … and both of those instances helped in their own way. The promotion on that Tourniquet album was right in the middle of our “hay day” or the peak of our circulation (from 15,000 to 23,000), which was when we did keep growing by word of mouth and healthy reputation. A little spontaneous help like this from an unexpected source would be awesome.

Who am I trying to please? This is a good question. Am I trying to please God? His body? Rock critics? All at the same time? Being honest about that is probably the healthy thing.

If I work hard and stay true to my focus, I’ll earn respect for that. Whether or not that respect is long-term or whether or not it translates into subscription sales, newsstand sales or advertising sales (all three are kind of necessary in sustaining a magazine) is another question. If I fail, I hope that I fail in doing good. I hope that I’d go out with my head held high, knowing I’d done my best and that I stayed true to my focus.

What if I found a sponsor for an issue? One of our former ad sales people, John J. Thompson, once found a sponsor for a special “Music Gear” section. This sponsor (Sam Ash Music) paid $7,500 to be the sponsor for that section. It was about 16 pages thick in one section of the magazine. Their corporate logo was on the cover of the magazine and their name and website url was on the border on the bottom of every page in that section. Maybe I could find a label that would sponsor an issue. Maybe they’d pay $10,000 to have their band on the cover. Maybe they could pick and choose content for 10 pages, filling it with ads, self-written content, have the band interview other bands covered … basically giving someone Managing Editor authority and control for an issue (while still maintaining many of the regular “departments,” like news, reviews, columns, etc). I’ve tried that a couple times since then and haven’t found a willing sponsor. Maybe with the right sales person.

“I want young men and women to be inspired to follow their dreams and rejoice in Me and be excited about Me…” That would be a good goal to have. The phrase “be excited about God” sticks out. I remember a quote from Undercover. I think it was Joey Taylor. I’m not trying to pick on Joey here, but I see one of his quotes in a new light now. Someone asked him about the change in the band from Boys and Girls Renounce the World to Branded and he said something like, “We didn’t want to be cheerleaders for God anymore” or “it got tired being a cheerleader.” I’m sure that’s a terrible misquote, but the point was “cheerleader” and the idea was that being a cheerleader for God was a shallow thing. I remember reading that quote and, even though I liked those old pop punk/new wave songs of theirs (like “Three Nails” and “Talk to God” and “God Rules”), it was hard not to respond in agreement. “Yeah! It is shallow to be a cheerleader!” I mean, cheerleaders are mocked by Will Farrell on SNL and some of them are kind of ditsy, don’t you think? But, even though “being excited about God” appears to be shallow (especially to the grumpy critic that is not excited about God at the moment), it is actually a deep, abiding thing.

The balance of Scripture does not allow complete ignorance towards suffering and failure, but the joy to carry on through the pain. Healing cannot be achieved by faking happiness, but instead by facing up to pain and pressing through. Joy is a choice and it is also a supernatural gift. So, being a cheerleader for God (even though that phrase is probably not the best choice of words) is not really a bad thing. It’s a good thing. So, embracing a role of encourager and one that serves the church is a good thing. It’s not about being fake. It’s not about lying about present circumstances. Honesty does not mean hopelessness, though. Hope and faith can see beyond present circumstances and press on towards healing, wholeness and a miracle. If someone won’t admit they’re sick, how can they be made well? If they don’t ask their daddy in Heaven to be made well, which implies that they are not well, then how can God answer their prayer and heal them?

HM Magazine is sick. We need a miracle. We need help. We are also pressing on in hopes of seeing God’s provision. I don’t know what that is or what it looks like, but I’m hoping for it. This summer I put my resume out there for a few jobs. This was being practical in light of our circumstances. If HM Magazine wasn’t bringing in enough money to provide for my family, I better do something. All the while praying for God’s provision, I still knew that sometimes His provision is working at Pizza Hut. At least it was back in 1986. For those that don’t know, I did not get the graphic designer jobs I applied for and my wife has actually switched places with me and got a job as a nurse. I have cut back my HM duties to part-time (though my family wouldn’t know it, because I seem to always be on this computer) and taken on the role as “Home School Dad.” It’s tough, but we are surviving.

Tell people how to support HM Magazine. This is one of the things I’ve done in 2010. If you recall, it was in February of 2010 that I first asked for donations. A lot of people have responded. We’ve tried to relieve the debt over our heads (from our business line of credit), but a lot of those funds went to immediate overhead, like print bills and such. Right now the debt ($23,000 or so) hangs over our heads and we pay mostly interest on that “loan,” but our regular ongoing costs are seeming to exceed our income. We need to sell more ads. That’s the short and immediate solution. Selling more subscriptions helps, because it is income (though in smaller increments) and it also helps convince advertisers when we have greater numbers of readers/subscribers. In telling people how they can help it gives people an option. It is a practical thing. I haven’t always practiced that, but it’s a pretty simple concept. If you let people know how they can help, it opens up more opportunity to help (they don’t have to resort to mind reading, haha).

Give Chad Johnson a voice. I have done that. He’s written 2 to 3 columns for us. Not sure what else he will do, but I want to support what he’s doing with Come&Live!. This “voice” could be hidden or present. Maybe he can offer editorial input, like suggesting artists or maybe some op-ed columns. Did you know that the phrase “op-ed” means “opposite the letters to editor” page. I always thought it was “opinion – editorial” or something like that. Nope. It was coined to mark where in the newspaper it appeared.

I went through each department in HM Magazine and evaluated whether or not it should be kept. I leaned on my Higher Power and hope that my ideas are good. What you’ve seen in the pages of HM in 2010 should reflect those ideas. Other ideas include a subscription fund-raiser. Perhaps a fifty/fifty proposition, where a youth group or non-profit could sell subscriptions and keep half the funds. This is tricky, because the person selling subscriptions on our behalf needs to be trustworthy. The person that they sell a subscription to (it may just be meeting a “quota” for this salesperson, but in my mind it’s like they) enters a covenant with HM Magazine. When they pay that $18 or whatever for that subscription … if they don’t get it in the mail later, guess who they get mad at? That’s right – us!

Maybe we could offer youth pastors a FREE SUBSCRIPTION if they show their youth group a video. Perhaps the video can be our 3 humorous 30-second spots (the ones with Gwar in them) – /etc/

Launch that other magazine. I have had this business plan in my hands for over a decade now … more like 12 years. It sounds crazy to launch another title, but with the right people (investors and employees) I could see that helping pull HM Magazine up. It’s something I have to act on, but I’ve hesitated … for a long time.

Podcast. We’ve found a way to increase the frequency of that thing. Thanks, Nate!

Talk to artists. Get their input. “What makes you want to avoid HM Magazine?” If that is the case with some, it would help me to know why that is. I’m not all focusing on the negative here, but I want to be able to hear criticism. It can be a wonderful and helpful thing if we let it. I want to let it.

Is HM like the cheesy youth group food you eat while going through high school … and then you move on? If that’s the case, my response might be, ‘Okay, if this is cheesy food, I want to make the best darn cheesy food there is!’ Or I could just quit. I think embracing what my real role is or should be is important. I have heard throughout the years (from time to time) a quote from an old reader that I come across: “…oh yeah, I used to read HM…” What that means is they don’t read it anymore. Some people transition away from this style of music (heavy, extreme forms of metal, hardcore, etc) and thus moving away from the magazine that champions this style would make sense. If some are transitioning away from HM Magazine, but not the style of music we cover, then I’d like to know why. Maybe it’s something that (much like the genre itself in terms of career) happens between the ages of 13, 14, 15 or 16 and the age of 22 or so… If that’s the case, I can either chase the older crowd, too, or I can zero in on our major fanbase and serve them the best I can. That’s the general idea I get or where I find myself wanting to lean. Granted, some of our readers are younger and some of them are older, but by and large the majority are in that high school and young college age range. Knowing that is important. Ask anyone in marketing, “How important are demographics?” and be prepared to sit down and hear a long answer.

My schedule. It is insane. I could do nothing but read and reply to emails all day long. That sucks. Email is almost the bane of my existence. I’m thinking about changing my old email address (dvanpelt-at-hmmag-dot-com), because I get so much spam from that one. But there are also a lot of legitimate emails I get on a daily basis. Some take a few seconds or even a few minutes to answer. I’m about to setup an auto-responder to get folks that I need to communicate with my new email address. That would lesson the volume. I also need to train myself (and perhaps some of my peers) to not reply so quickly to emails. I go crazy if my inbox is not empty. But maybe someone asking me about sponsoring a festival or tour … maybe I can wait a week before I answer that. I’d really like to be able to accomplish what is really important each day, instead of just knowing that I got my inbox down to zero plus maybe a couple of other things. Running a magazine and a small business involves a lot of details. I’m trying to do all this myself … and on a part-time work schedule. It’s impossible. The only reason I’m trying is the alternative is death (to the magazine).

Create a volunteer army. I could use a volunteer staff here. We have the ability to house people. It has to be the right people and the right combination of people. There is nothing worse than working with people you don’t want to work with. Well, that is not the worst thing, but it’s a quote I remember from a business partner that offered me a job a long time ago working for their computer company. They liked me and knew my get up and go attitude could serve them well, but they asked me to cut my hair. ha ha ha. I said no. That’s when I was starting to work with Heaven’s Metal Magazine full-time. The year was 1989 and it was a great decision. The hair part wasn’t so important, but staying true to the Heaven’s Metal vision was. It is possible to have volunteers work for HM Magazine long-distance. The internet is a great tool (and so is the telephone), so a lot of this stuff can be done long distance.

Some of the help I need includes: selling ads; promoting HM Magazine to stores; promoting it to youth workers, churches, parents; proofreading; getting HM Magazine publicity in local, regional media outlets (radio, tv, newspapers); passing out flyers and postcards to local venues; communicating with bands and keeping them supplied with HM promotional materials (mostly postcards); writing articles; transcribing interviews; reviewing albums; gathering photos and artwork; laying out articles; replying to emails (that could be tricky); getting corporate sponsorships (wouldn’t it be cool to have an HM download card or code on cups at Chick-Fil-A or a sampler CD with lots of the bands we cover from multiple labels on sale in retail stores like Best Buy and Walmart; securing an app for the iPad; collect unpaid debt owed to HM; an HM Magazine Music Festival (Lee Haley is working on that). If I can delegate a lot of the work I have to do, it will help me.

Proverbs 8

1

¹ Does not Wisdom call, and Understanding raise her voice?

2

On the top of the heights along the road, at the crossroads she takes her stand;

3

By the gates at the approaches of the city, in the entryways she cries aloud:

4

“To you, O men, I call; my appeal is to the children of men.

5

² You simple ones, gain resource, you fools, gain sense.

6

“Give heed! for noble things I speak; honesty opens my lips.

7

³ Yes, the truth my mouth recounts, but the wickedness my lips abhor.

8

Sincere are all the words of my mouth, no one of them is wily or crooked;

9

All of them are plain to the man of intelligence, and right to those who attain knowledge.

10

Receive my instruction in preference to silver, and knowledge rather than choice gold.

11

(For Wisdom is better than corals, and no choice possessions can compare with her.)

12

“I, Wisdom, dwell with experience, and judicious knowledge I attain.

13

(The fear of the LORD is to hate evil;) Pride, arrogance, the evil way, and the perverse mouth I hate.

14

⁴ Mine are counsel and advice; Mine is strength; I am understanding.

15

By me kings reign, and lawgivers establish justice;

16

By me princes govern, and nobles; all the rulers of earth.

17

“Those who love me I also love, and those who seek me find me.

18

With me are riches and honor, enduring wealth and prosperity.

19

My fruit is better than gold, yes, than pure gold, and my revenue than choice silver.

20

On the way of duty I walk, along the paths of justice,

21

Granting wealth to those who love me, and filling their treasuries.

22

⁵ “The LORD begot me, the first-born of his ways, the forerunner of his prodigies of long ago;

23

⁶ From of old I was poured forth, at the first, before the earth.

24

⁷ When there were no depths I was brought forth, when there were no fountains or springs of water;

25

Before the mountains were settled into place, before the hills, I was brought forth;

26

While as yet the earth and the fields were not made, nor the first clods of the world.

27

“When he established the heavens I was there, when he marked out the vault over the face of the deep;

28

When he made firm the skies above, when he fixed fast the foundations of the earth;

29

When he set for the sea its limit, so that the waters should not transgress his command;

30

⁸ Then was I beside him as his craftsman, and I was his delight day by day, Playing before him all the while,

31

playing on the surface of his earth; and I found delight in the sons of men.

32

“So now, O children, listen to me;

33

instruction and wisdom do not reject! Happy the man who obeys me, and happy those who keep my ways,

34

Happy the man watching daily at my gates, waiting at my doorposts;

35

For he who finds me finds life, and wins favor from the LORD;

36

But he who misses me harms himself; all who hate me love death.”

Psalm 1

Lastly, there is this thought:
Embrace the pastoral role of HM Magazine (not the title “Pastor,” but the idea of serving those in the Christian hard music community). Maybe have an advice column? I think that is a stupid idea, personally. Embracing a role is one thing, but posting an “advice column” is kind of like taking a title, isn’t it? Maybe this could be done carefully. Not sure anyone would listen, read or ask questions, but it’s a thought.

What do you think? I’ve posted a lot here. Any thoughts? Suggestions and prayers are welcomed.

Merry Christmas!