Ten accidental years ost Canadian magazine launches fail within a few issues. Canada is simply a small market to attempt to carve out a successful media niche. When it happens, success is a delicate mix of timing, intuition, a keen understanding of the mar-ket, and good content. Oh yeah, and luck. In the case of Canadian Biomass , that luck came in the form of a long-time competitor of our forestry magazine Canadi-an Forest Industries — Rob Stanhope, the publisher of Logging & Sawmilling Journal . Rob and I were attending World Bioenergy in Sweden in June of 2008, and there were many Canadians in attendance and lots of buzz around the industry. We may all have been a little desper-ate after a couple of years of the U.S. hous-ing market collapse, and so saw a possible saviour in all things bioenergy. Having a beer with Rob just before head-ing back to Canada, Rob asked a question that I had been asking myself through the whole conference — “What was I going to do about all of this bioenergy buzz?” I told him I didn’t know, that we’d probably not do much more than we were doing already in the pages of Canadian Forest Industries . And that was true at the time. And then I woke up during my flight home with a start. If Rob was asking me my plans, he was likely planning something himself. I was damned if he was going to be first out of the gate in this emerging market, so I sketched out the first issue on a pad of paper during the rest of the flight, assem-bled a launch team the next day, and the first issue of Canadian Biomass rolled off the press less than two months later. We made $455 profit on that first issue, no small feat for issue No. 1. Some maga-BIOMASS $"/"%*"/ Volume 18 No. 5 Editor -Maria Church (226) 931-1396 [email protected] Associate Editor -Tamar Atik (416) 510-5211 [email protected] Contributors -Lesley Allan, Jim Grey, Marie-Hélène Labrie, Gordon Murray, Jordan Solomon, and John Swaan. Editorial Director/Group Publisher -Scott Jamieson (519) 429-3966 ext 244 [email protected] M zines lose money for years before they es-tablish readership and a client base. We’ve made money ever since, although in some years not a lot. But people are working, the industry is getting reported on, and we con-tinue to promote the benefits of the biomass sector. We soon added a website and enewslet-ters, then social media, and began partnering with the Wood Pellet Association of Canada on all things mar-keting, including their an-nual event. We do webinars and the Pellet Mill Map. In fact, more people now know us for all of these things than the actual magazine, and that’s just fine. We’ve seen a few compet-itors come and go along the way. The CANBIO association tried their hand at a magazine for a few years, but it vanished, followed soon after by the asso-ciation itself. Our colleagues south of the border, BBI International, tried a Canadian media brand, but it was short lived. Each discovered how hard it is to run a magazine around a constantly emerging industry. The biomass “market explosion” I guar-anteed in the first issue has yet to happen, as current editor Maria Church so kindly re-minds me in her retrospective on page 10. But the industry survives, some parts thrive, and continues to grow. Almost 60 issues lat-er, we’re still here covering it. I never did ask Rob if he was considering launching a biomass magazine back then. Either way, thanks for the inspiration, Rob. Next round’s on me. • Scott Jamieson, Founding Editor Account Coordinator -Stephanie DeFields Ph: (519) 429-5196 sdefi[email protected] National Sales Manager -Ross Anderson Ph: (519) 429-5188 Fax: (519) 429-3094 [email protected] Quebec Sales -Josée Crevier Ph: (514) 425-0025 Fax: (514) 425-0068 [email protected] Western Sales Manager -Tim Shaddick [email protected] Ph: (604) 264-1158 Fax: (604) 264-1367 Media Designer -Curtis Martin Circulation Manager – Jay Doshi [email protected] Ph: (416) 442-5600 ext. 5124 President/CEO Mike Fredericks Canadian Biomass is published six times a year: February, April, June, August, October, and December. Published and printed by Annex Business Media. Publication Mail Agreement # 40065710 Printed in Canada ISSN 2290-3097 Subscription Rates: Canada -1 Yr $56.00; 2 Yr $100.00 Single Copy -$9.00 (Canadian prices do not include applicable taxes) USA – 1 Yr $91.60 US; Foreign – 1 Yr $104.00 US CIRCULATION [email protected] Tel: (416) 510-5109 Fax: (416) 510-6875 or (416) 442-2191 111 Gordon Baker Rd., Suite 400, Toronto, ON M2H 3R1 Annex Privacy Officer [email protected] Tel: 800-668-2374 Occasionally, Canadian Biomass magazine will mail information on behalf of industry-related groups whose products and services we believe may be of interest to you. If you prefer not to receive this information, please contact our circulation department in any of the four ways listed above. No part of the editorial content of this publication may be reprinted without the publisher’s written permission ©2018 Annex Business Media, All rights reserved. Opinions expressed in this magazine are not necessarily those of the editor or publisher. No liability is assumed for errors or omissions. All advertising is subject to the publisher’s approval. Such approval does not imply any endorsement of the products or services advertised. Publisher reserves the right to refuse advertising that does not meet the standards of the publication. www.canadianbiomassmagazine.ca 4 Canadian BIOMASS SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2018
Canadian Biomass September-October 2018: Page 4
