David: Hello. Tri Village Chamber Partnership. David Polakowski, president and CEO. We have Katie Ellis, our operations manager.
Katie: Good morning.
David: And we are excited to have City Scene magazine and Tribe Village magazine, who is part of the city. City scene with us today. Laura Pappas, who is the dirt. Your title. Why did that just go out?
Laura: Advertising sales manager.
David: There we go. And Kathy Gill, who is the CEO and president of City Scene. Welcome.
Kathy: Uh, good morning. Thanks for having us.
David: I'm going to tell you, this is a fun one because Cathy's nervous. She didn't know how to go there. So if you listened in the past, there is no preparation. So, um, welcome, ladies.
Kathy: Thanks.
David: City Scene.
Kathy: Yes.
David: Let's go. Cathy, how did you get here?
Kathy: Oh, my story is a long and winding road, but not as tuneful or musical as the Beatles, perhaps. So the company started in 1999. Even before that, the original company started back in the late 70s as, um, an advertising PR agency. And, um, then through the years in like, the company, um, became the producer of the OSU game day programs. OSU football and basketball game day programs. Had it for 17 years. Lost the proposal, the bid in 98. And the leadership of the company was like, oh my god, what are we going to do now? Hello. We need to have a company. So in 1999, our, um, founder was Fred Zimmerman. And he started the company with a magazine called Dublin Life. So Dublin Life magazine was started with a partnership with the city of Dublin, um, and at the same time started City Scene magazine, which was started in partnership with the arts organizations. So 1999, maybe a lifetime ago to some people, not me, but back in 1999, there was no experience. Um, Columbus. It was the Greater Columbus Convention and Visitors Bureau, which was just as exciting as its name, right? And they didn't have a visitor's guide. So City Scene magazine originally started in 99 to fill that need as the visitors guide for Columbus in central Ohio. Um, as experienced Columbus kind of morphed into existence right around the turn of the century, I guess. City, um, scene in 2001 went to home delivery where it was mailed as a regular mailed, uh, subscription. And, um, in partnership still with the arts organizations. But to back up to Dublin Life started in 99. Two, um, weeks later, the, uh, company got a phone call from then City Manager Rich King, who was city manager for the city of Upper Arlington, and called and said, hey, I just saw this magazine in Dublin Life. And where are you at? Uh, why don't we have one of these? Yeah. So that was August of 99 and the first issue of Upper Arlington magazine mailed to all city residents in partnership with the city of Upper Arlington in November of 99. So that's kind of the long history. Um, then from there, the company just continued to grow. So in, um, 2001, like I said, we switched over City Scene magazine from being in hotels as a visitor's guide to mailed home delivery. Uh, 2001 we started a Westerville magazine. Um, 2009 we started Pickerington magazine. 2011, we started Healthy New Albany magazine. And most recently in 2018 we started Discover Grove City magazine. So I think that's all of them there, um, are seven. And in 2009, Upper Arlington magazine changed names to incorporate Grand View and Marble Cliff. And it became Tri Village magazine.
David: That's what I was just going to ask. How did we get to Trivillage?
Kathy: It switched over for the first ten years, it was just up for Arlington Magazine because that's who we had a partnership with. So it was kind of the same sort of thing that, um, Pat lost his last name pat City of Grandview Heights was, um, like, hey, can we get this magazine for Grandview also? And we were like, oh, what a good idea. And also the upper Arlington chamber. There used to be an upper Arlington chamber in a separate grand view chamber. So they were morphing together for the Tri Village Chamber partnership. So this whole thing just really made a lot of sense. And we were saying, just because you live north or south of Fifth Avenue doesn't mean that you don't care about what's going on on the other side. I mean, the communities have been really good buddies for a long time.
David: Yes. In 2015 when we merged, when we merged, my coming things are really progressing. And Laura, how did you get here? Because you have another career that used to be incorrect.
Laura: Yes. So my sales background was primarily radio and TV. So this was my first go around with print. So, you know, it's a little bit different than selling airtime, which I did for years and years. And um, came upon City Scene through a friend of mine. And yeah, um, just starting in February of this year and just now learned a lot about this company.
Kathy: We're going to call this so technically we're City Seed Media Group with the City Seed magazine and the other five, six community magazines. I probably missed one of them there. But, um, we're going to save this and call this CMG 101. And then everybody can say this is how because I actually met our founder at a party when I was like 21. Um, and I was looking for a job just right out of college I went to work for him. And so that was our connection in the then I took a 16 year maternity leave, had four kids, and came back to the reorganized company in 2001. So the thing is that like Laura was saying, if you're doing sales, your background has to be really strong in marketing because obviously there's different ways to market. But if you know marketing, you know marketing and you can figure out what's the best way for you to present your company and to grow your company, whether it's on radio or TV or print or digital. And they're all different, but they're all, at core, kind of the same. But some of the different mediums lend themselves better to different kinds of marketing.
Laura: Business to business sales. So we're anxious to get back into that. And working in the Dublin area and Tri Village and meeting nice people like you.
David: It's a fun area, but it is a great chamber. Looking at where the heavy imprint was in the past, how do you, in today's market, sell it, print today? How is it?
Kathy: I love it. Print is dead. I love it when somebody says that to me because I say, yes, absolutely it is. And then, of course, their jaw drops and they're like, oh, she's so cynical. But, um, yeah, print is dead for news. Because if there's a fire on 315, I'm not going to wait and read about it tomorrow morning in the paper. That's something that I'm going to see online. I'm going to be seeing that on my phone. I'm going to be seeing that it's coming up in my news feed on social media. It's like all of that stuff. But what we do is really it's, um, not news. I mean, we might have feature, um, articles that are timely, but they're not new. They're entertainment. And so from our standpoint, our magazines are all niche publications which are growing and doing really well. So, um, for example, if you live in Dublin and I mail you Westerville magazine, you're not going to care. You're not going to read it. But if you live in Dublin and I mail you Dublin Life, you're going to read it because it's all about your community, your neighbors, what's going on, things like that. Same thing, obviously, for Tri Village. And again, uh, it's that are you north or south of Fifth Avenue? Who cares? Because it's people that you know, people that you see, I'm going to go into a song and dance with Mr. Rogers. But who are the people in your neighborhood? Uh, so from a marketing standpoint, how do we sell it? We, um, have amazingly high readership. Uh, and even in cities scene, we know what our readers are interested in. That, um, they're arts patrons. So arts and entertainment. If we all of a sudden start writing about hunting and fishing, our readership levels would probably drop. So print is known for branding. Print is known for couponing. We really don't do couponing in the magazine just because it's a four color, beautiful magazine. People tend to not really rip coupons out of there. But I would say what we've done really well and what we always promoted is cross platform, um, marketing and whether, um, it's for branding, whether it's for ROI. You can see, obviously, everything is for ROI. Starting back in 1999 when we started the magazines up they each had their own website. Every magazine started with a website. And in 1999, I mean, we're talking, like, dial up, right? We were paying interactive, um, inc per word to put, like, the magazine, um, articles per word. That's how we paid. It was all cloak and mirrors anyway. But what that goes back to is our websites literally date back to when the magazine started. So 99 for Dublin Tribillage and city scene. We are dinosaurs. Google loves us because if you think about what we do, all we do is just keep putting new content up online. So each of the magazines had their own websites. We were young and dumb, so they were all dead, um, ends. And so I think it was about 2005 that all of a sudden, it was like, oh my gosh, we're like, dead ending all of our company products. And we actually merged under Cities and Columbus as our umbrella site. And then each of if you type in, it's kinda long trivillagemagazine.com, it takes you to that home page for Trivillage magazine, but it's part, um, of the larger city scene. So from a marketing standpoint, our websites really do very well. And again, um, we do things a little differently. So we sell digital ads. Not by impressions. Everybody else does it. I don't know anybody else who does it this way. If you buy a digital ad with us, it goes on from, oh, do you want it? From August 1 through September 1. And you get as many impressions as you get, but it's a flat fee. So part of it is with our sales reps, they're used to selling print, which is like one price, one issue, and go. And so we kind of do digital the same way. But the best thing is when you marry the digital with the print, and then we also have a lot of social media anyway, um, campaigns. That's what we put together. The multi platform does that. Yeah, I'm just talking a lot.
David: No, you're fine. This is what keeps us pulling that stream to keep our conversation.
Kathy: Imagine that over 20 years, how the face of the industry has changed. And we keep morphing as well. Sometimes they're pulling me along, kicking and screaming, going, oh, my God, do we have to learn something new? This is so annoying. And we have a, um, weekly newsletter. So now we have Laura. Um, do you love our this is what I usually do when we have new people start the company. We have a sales sheet and we call it our Media Buffet. And it's literally the list of everything that we do versus before, it was like, we have a print magazine and we kind of have this website, but we're not really sure how to use it. And so all the way through to the Media Buffet, that's like the weekly newsletter. We do contests, we have videos. It's like, yes, there it is. It's crazy. It's a lot to keep track of.
Laura: The magazines come out every other month, are issued every other month, so they have a shelf life of about five.
Kathy: To eight weeks, up to eight weeks.
Laura: And they usually it's very targeted marketing. So with social media online, you get all the interruptions on Facebook or Instagram or whatever, and you just kind of go through. But with print, you're a little more focused on the article. And it just, I think, sinks in.
Kathy: Before, we used to say that print is the medium that goes with you. So if you're going to the pool, you can bring your favorite magazine. It goes with you. But now, obviously, we have these miniature little computers that are in our hands that go with us everywhere. Everywhere.
David: As I'm looking at your website and.
Kathy: We'Re talking here, and that's the thing. Over 20 years, we do reader surveys, right, and we say, how long do you keep the magazine? How many people read it? All of that stuff. And there's always like one or two people that it's. Like, I have every copy since the first one in November. And I'm like, oh, really? Because we're missing the September issue of 2003. Could we borrow that from or leave that to us? We're doing our library there. Um, are the folks like that? But we love them. I mean, people love their communities. People move away and they'll call or email and say, hey, I'm living in Florida, or I've retired to Colorado, but can I still get a copy of Tri Village magazine? Uh, and we're like, sure. People get very attached to it. We get a lot, um, of input. It's, uh, like people usually are. Like, how do you figure out who you're going to write about? Or what you know you're going to write about it's. Like, most of the time it's people reaching out to us saying, oh, my god, my neighbor just went on this trip and did blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And it's so cool and you should reach out to them. And it's like, okay, we will. We, um, still do a lot of stuff in partnership with the city of Upper, uh, Arlington and Grandview, and even tiny little Marble Cliff. So, um, as far as community that the schools pitch us amazing stories and ideas, um, we do. And once a year in September, we hold a meeting usually. Um, we go back and forth. I don't remember last year we were at the Grand View Library. So I think this September will be at the Arlington Tree Month library. And it's open to everybody in the community. And it's just a big story, uh, pitch session. So we invite everybody to, um, come to that. We'll be putting stuff, um, out in our newsletter and on the website about dates and times. But once a year we do that and get a lot of really good ideas from people there.
Katie: So then what's the best way, if you want to attend this pitch session, what are you looking for? What's the best way someone can prepare to pitch perfect.
Kathy: So we do have this kind of pitch session once a year, and I guess to prepare for that, it's like if you're a little bit familiar with the magazine, that we're always looking for different categories of stories. So we're always looking for personalities to feature personalities. We're always looking for events, especially if they're new events or grassroots events. Sometimes we'll feature smaller events that neighborhoods, um, are putting on versus the larger events like the arts and UA. Also we're always looking for food stories. We love doing um, where somebody wants to share a recipe. So if you live in, um, the community, and let's say your kids on a soccer team, and there's some jojo down the street who has a kid on the team, and they make the best energy bars, that put us in contact with that person because we want to share that recipe also we do that living stories. Um, so if there's somebody that's doing a remodeling, or if you see building and remodeling going on and you want the inside scoop, tell us about that, because we'll send a reporter to go figure out what are they really doing over there at the corner? Are they building a roundabout or what are they doing? So those are um, all kind of the topics, uh, if you will, to pitch at the pitch story. But if you can't come to that, because as I said, it's once a year, we want your input all year round. So the biggest, best thing is send an email call in the front of the magazine. There is contact info for everybody. There's the main office line. Call the office line and say, I have a story idea for Tri Village magazine. Whoever answers will put you in contact with the right editor. Send an um email. It lists out everybody's email addresses. It's also on our website, Trivillacmagazine.com. And anytime, um, during the year you can call, you can email, you can send us a um, letter. But the biggest thing is just to tell us that, hey, I've got a good idea for a story and check it out and at least let us know so we can go and investigate and kind of do our homework, um, and try and bring some more good stories to everybody. Beautiful.
Laura: Well, in our advertising clients, too, they want to be profiled.
Kathy: I don't want to buy an ad, just do a profile. That my business. Everybody has a story. Every story is wonderful and great, but my ad, it's a better way to do to pitch your message. And it's got all your contact info.
David: But anyway, my four page spread that they did last summer on me, i, uh, still have magazines from it. It was a great and thank you for the highlight and the coverage, because it really was a lot of fun. Again, reading about yourself is like, whoa.
Laura: Do you get extra copies for your family?
Kathy: Did anybody come up and ask for your autocraft?
David: Yes, they have. And I'm like, not today. What are your favorite stories? What are the stories that you in sales and in print that you have had that really highlight, uh, what you've done over your career and in your short time that you've been with City Scene?
Laura: Yeah, I get some advertisers, uh, some businesses who have some really interesting back stories. I could name a few. One of, um, the stories was I don't know if it's a vegan, but a restaurant, Clean Eating, that just opened in Dublin. And Clintonville, and I think he's expanded to New Albany.
Kathy: Clean Eats. Okay.
Laura: Clean Eating. And, um, the concept came about because he's a former White Sox baseball player who got into this business, was injured in his career, and, um, started this business in Columbus. And, uh Casey Schroeder. Yeah. Name and name.
David: And it's funny because as we were talking, that's one of the things I was going through the Trial magazine online, and that's what popped up.
Kathy: Yeah.
Laura: Is that what popped, uh, up?
David: Well, yeah, I think it's at the top.
Laura: Okay. Yeah.
Kathy: I go back and forth because sometimes I'm like, um, the HGTV person. It's like, oh, my God, I love all the so sometimes I would say some of the home renovations are my favorites, um, because I always look and then I'm like, oh, yeah, I totally would not have picked that countertop. What were they thinking? So I like looking at some of those and also some of the ideas for the backyard and outdoor entertaining. But overall, I think it's the personalities. And whether there's somebody, um, who has a business background or just somebody they do the golden, um, Apple Teacher Awards. And sometimes it's been, um, like I said earlier, I have four kids that all went through the schools. And it's like, oh, my gosh, it's one of their former teachers. And it's like, you only know them as what you see when you're picking up dropping off, like, whatever parent teacher meetings. Okay. It's a teacher. And then you read their backstory. Um, and sometimes they're just really, like, touching stories about why they got into teaching or why they chose this. So it's really the backstories of the people. There was one, um, that sticks out, and I mean, this is, um, probably from ten years ago, and it was, um, Mr. Kareem, and, uh, I have to call him Mr. Karen because he was like, the age of my dad. But, um, his kids he has four kids who are like, my age, and then his grandkids went to school with my kids. Right. Anyway, but this family has lived in Arlington since the they are Lebanese American. But the reason I'm telling you that is because Mr. Karen was friends and somehow met Danny Thomas back in, like, the they formed this group ALSAC, which stands for American Lebanese Society. I don't even know, uh, what I'm telling you. These people that formed this group. And Danny Thomas, who started St. Jude's Children's Hospital in Memphis, okay, well, Mr. Kerr lived and raised his family here in Upper Arlington. I have to say that it's like out of maybe the, uh, last since 2001. So 22 years. 21 years. Bad at math. That might be, um, the story that has stuck with me the most. Anyway. And as a company, we like to think that we're very philanthropic. Obviously we could always do better. But we have supported Discovered the Dream, which is an annual fundraise in Gala that directly goes back to St. Jude's. And it's a cool thing because, let's face it, we live in Columbus, Ohio. We have nationwide children's hospital here. But how cool is it that we get to live here? And if you had a kid with a problem that's right there, but also Saint Judes, how can you not support that, right? So we've supported Saint Judes and Discover the Dream as a company since they started doing Discover the Dream, which is almost 15 years ago. They've raised, I think, almost $10 million at that time that is going back directly for research, like no overhead. It's the most amazing group. And Mr. Kareem started that here in Columbus, Ohio, and now he passed away a couple of years ago and his adult kids are taking it on. And we went to the event this year. His grandkids are now like, in their twenty s and thirty s, uh, and they're still doing it. But anyway, to read the backstory and to know that that's like, the neighbor next door.
David: Anyway no, I get it.
Kathy: Some of the stories I just get really passionate about is like we just did a story this summer about the woman who is like, the core of the Dublin Food Pantry and she was featured on the cover, um, of Dublin Life magazine for this August, um, issue. And we were at the Irish Festival last weekend. Hottest, nastiest, hottest winner. Oh my God. Every year it's the hottest weekend of the year. But she was up, um, there and she was like, just saying, oh my gosh, what is going on here? My face was on the cover of this magazine. So David, it's like you she's like, people are asking me to speak. Well, we were handing out the magazine, too, anyway. But she had an amazing story as well. So through the years, there's a couple that really kind of hit home, I.
Laura: Think, dealing with a lot of small businesses. Everybody's got a backstory. It's so interesting to learn how they got into the business, small businesses, it's hard.
Kathy: And how they're giving back to the community. Because if it's just a plain old business profile, we're not business first. We're not going to just do it about the business. We do the story about the person behind the business and then what they're doing in the community and their ties. Um, and it just really makes the city feel like, um, a small town. And it's amazing how everybody still knows each other.
David: And the fourth situation, it's all scary. How the interconnection? There's so many positive things in all three communities. And I thank you both for highlighting and taking the Tri Village magazine to what it is today, because I still think we have magazines here if, um, anybody needs to get one at Cohat. But I think it's just a great way to highlight who we are and what we do in our trivillage area.
Kathy: Yeah.
David: So thank you, ladies.
Kathy: Thanks for having her.
Laura: Having us.
David: Talk soon. Village