A new beginning
If you read Jeremy’s magCulture blog you’ll already know that today is my first day running Stack full time.
I started Stack in December 2008 as a project I worked on one day a week (plus evenings and weekends) and since then, as the business has grown, I’ve managed to annex more and more of my week for Stack. Leaving a job I love at Human After All still feels like a ridiculous thing to do, but the time has come to put all my energy into Stack and take it to the next stage.
The trouble is, I now need to work out exactly what that means. There are some very immediate things to do (my home has been invaded by cardboard boxes full of magazines, which will need to be stored in some more efficient manner) but the tricky bit comes after that.
There are tons of opportunities sprawling out in front of me at the moment, and it’s going to be difficult figuring out which ones stand the best chance of succeeding.
For example, I’m definitely going to increase advertising, but where? I’m very interested in the idea of what Stack could be as a digital product, but which platform should I publish on, and how? I love teaching and writing about magazines, but how do I do those things in ways that don’t detract from building the main service? And the big question; how do I make sure more people want to buy Stack year-round, rather than in one big spike at Christmas?
I’ve learned a huge amount since I started Stack, and looking at that list it’s clear that there’s a lot more I’ll need to learn in the coming months and years. But that’s the exciting bit.
Thanks very much to everyone who has subscribed to Stack over the last five years, and to all the publishers, editors, art directors, bloggers, Humans and other good people who have helped to make Stack what it is.
Now, I’ve got some boxes to move.
