ForeThought: Working on what's working

June 3, 2010 | by Galynn Nordstrom

Yesterday, they allowed a few of us IFAI editors out of the office, and I attended the Minnesota Magazine & Publishing Association 2010 Summit & Expo. The magazine publishing industry, supported to a large extent by advertising, has taken large and painful hits to the revenues, but there are definite signs that we're starting to find handholds on the sides of the pit, and the vipers at the bottom are getting sleepy. Accordingly, the theme of the conference was "Looking forward," and when David Carr, media columnist for the New York Times, asked us how we were feeling after having survived the last couple of years, he told us that we were a group of "tenacious [your very pungent plural improper noun here]" and should be feeling not only damned proud of ourselves but ready to take the next steps. His presentation, fittingly, was entitled "The good news is that there is some."

There have been other setbacks, of course. The World Wide Web, digital publishing and the more recent phenomena of social media networking and marketing have been gnawing away at print publications for some time. Carr told us, however, that these are just adding new routes to consumers, and creating real, actual communities of interest, with two-way communication with our audiences. But as information burgeons electronically, it will be much more critical to ensure what the electronic wizards are calling "content curation," and what magazine editors have always called ... editing. Quality still matters, and we still have to make sure that we're creating it, and that people can find it. For our readers, that imperative is the same; according to Carr, that means "work on what's working."

He cautioned, however, that we survivors must be willing to innovate to keep going, and use the new technologies to do what we do best.

Probably everyone is pleased enough to say goodbye to fiscal year 2009, including the Industrial Fabrics Association International (IFAI). But outreach here continues, and is accelerating. Geosynthetic Materials Association (GMA) managing director Andrew Aho recently told us that the U.S. EPA has announced a notice of proposed rulemaking that will require lining of coal ash containment sites. GMA has been advocating for such a regulation, and successfully lobbied members of Congress to support it. When adopted, these new regulations will have a tremendous impact on the geosynthetic materials market in the U.S.

Next March, we'll hold the first-ever IFAI Expo Asia at the new Marina Bay Sands Hotel and Exhibition Centre in Singapore. Current trade shows in India and China focus almost exclusively on the disposable nonwoven industry. IFAI Expo Asia 2011 will become the first major event in the region that specifically targets as visitors the end-product fabricators who use all types of materials-woven, nonwoven, knit and composite textiles.

It's a risk, true--but it's also an opportunity to build another audience, and now's the time.

June 2010 is the start of our 2011 fiscal year for the Specialty Fabrics Review. I'm hoping for more of that two-way communication with you this year, through whichever method of communication you prefer. As for me, I'm hoping to do a little judicious tweeting and blogging at IFAI Expo Americas this October, if I can convince our worthy Webmistress to trust me with the keys. Wine may be mentioned, but only in passing. See you there.

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