2021: Planning the Year

They say 2021 is just 2020 with bangs. Yesterday I shared my thoughts about 2020. Today I am sharing my thoughts about 2021. I refuse to believe that 2021 cannot be a better year. I believe we must take the lessons learned from last year and carry those into action in this year. I have always believe that prayer without action is a wasted prayer. I believe a lesson learned without applying it to the future is wasted potential and wasted pain. As we look in 2021 here at FOLK I am putting it into writing and manifesting that I want us to continue the work we did promoting makers and creatives and small businesses in 2020 and push to do more and reach more in 2021. 

My goals are to expand our wholesale and be in 100 stores by the end of the year. I am confident we can do that. The plan is to bring in a person that will manage the growth and oversee those accounts. Every product that we offer on in our shop, at our events, or via wholesale is made by small makers. We take such pride in getting to work with so many talented makers. These goods aren’t made in a factory or in China…they are made right here at home by hand. 

This year we will also be expanding our website to have daily and weekly features. I love to write, but for so long have found excuses to get out of writing. This will change. There is just too much to share. 

Late last year I started playing with video. I wanted to create videos of old fashioned recipes and slow living things I have learned here on the farm over the years. I’m still not very good at it, but I am enjoying the process. I will begin those next week. Here is one from last year if you’d like to check it out. Like with any new skill I told myself I just had to start. I would learn by doing. I wouldn’t be perfect on the first try. We will learn together.

As I said in yesterday’s post we will find a new platform for the marketplace this year. It was too good of a thing not to carry on. Finding the perfect partner will be key. The goal is to get it to a place where a job will be created to oversee the marketplace and it can run on its own…becoming a place where makers and small businesses can sell their goods. 

Print is the big one for 2021, much like it was for 2020. Last year I would have never dreamt of the response we would have. Last year was an incredibly bad year for print. I wanted several of my friends, people I had respected and looked up to for many years totally implode. Before 2020 my goal was to not be one of them. I knew if we were going to do print we had to do it as lean as possible….meaning I would be doing it all myself. The hard work is worth it. Always. It absolutely is. This year we will release a travel/wanderlust issue as soon as the USPS has media mail sorted and back on track. From there we will have an early summer Slow Living issue, an autumn issue, and an October release of our Christmas issue. We will also be releasing a hardcover 10 year anthology of my favorite stories from the decade. The book will release early autumn. We are starting this year with a special issue of FOLK called MADE. I envision MADE becoming an annual collection of conversations with makers. I would say it will release in early March. We are switching printers and their lead time is much longer than the previous printer…but they are much more affordable. That leads to the thing I am most excited for….I will be the first to acknowledge that our cover price isn’t the most affordable. It is the price it is because there are no ads and we do limited distribution. Our issues are never filled with sponsored content or advertisements. That means the entirety of the production budget comes from the magazines selling. If we ever start adding ads to the issues you will see our cover price go down, but until then we make the issues as packaged with meaningful content as possible. With the switch to the new printer we are able to reformat and reprint several back issues. We are offering them through the month of January for $5 per copy. If you have wanted to order FOLK but have been hesitant because of the price, this is the time to order. 

I will leave it there for today. There are more things in store, but that is for another day.

Thank you.

Ben 

P.S. I will also start proofing these this year. I am forever in a hurry and don’t proofread like I should.