WHAT A YEAR THAT WAS! 110° Magazine Begins its Second Year of Publication
	OCTOBER 2004

by Don Huntington

I recently learned that 6,000 new magazines were started in the U.S. last year, but only a small fraction of them ever made it through the first year. We are delighted and grateful to have been able to be part of that select group of survivors, since you are reading this article in the first issue of our second year.

Not only did we make it to our first anniversary issue, but we are going strong. We on the staff have greater enthusiasm and confidence than ever before.

What a Year Indeed!
We've had a great year! We've created a magazine that, in our opinion, has looked great during every issue and has been constantly full of interesting content.

One of my most vivid memories is of a moment that Richard Koscher, the Publisher, and I shared when we were at the press run last September for our first issue.

We had planned from the beginning to create a publication of extraordinary quality. For example, before we ever wrote a single sentence of actual content, Richard had created some sample pages that I thought were wonderful.

However, standing by the output rack of the huge press that was running our first issue we had an astonishing revelation. Big web presses run pages in what they call 16-page "signatures"—which is the word referring to super-large pages each containing sixteen different final pages, eight on a side, that are later cut and collated into the actual magazine.

Richard and I stood there holding the first of these signatures and we both were overwhelmed by what we were holding in our hands. I remember we stared at each other in something like awe, and I said, "What have we done, Richard?"

Even though we had expected the magazine to look good, we couldn't believe how great it had actually turned out.

At that moment both Richard and I felt particularly blessed, I think. It seemed clear to us that we had created something that exceeded the boundaries of what we could have accomplished by our native abilities alone.

The question, "What have we done?" was almost immediately replaced by a much more sobering question, "Can we do this again?" We had worked three months on the first issue and had to get the next one out in 28 days. We ended up beating the deadline by more than 24 hours—and succeeded in creating a second issue that was, in our opinion, even better than the first. We again felt that our efforts had been blessed.

We continued the experience during all the subsequent issues—believing each of them to be an improvement over the one before. We certainly think this current issue to be, by far, the best one yet.

We have been particularly gratified by industry recognition that we received this year. One of our pictures, for example, was nominated for a prestigious Maggie Award. We were competing with such established publications as San Francisco Magazine. We also recently won "Best Cover" and "Best Overall Magazine" from the American Graphic Design Awards, competing publications from coast-to-coast.

Extraordinary Stories and People
One of the unexpected outcomes of my work during this past year turned out to be the incredible number of wonderful people I met while putting articles together. I can't tell you how many times I came to the settled conviction, "This is the most interesting person I ever met!" and "This is the most wonderful article I ever read!"

Of course, all the writers and subjects of articles during the past year can't be "most interesting"! All the articles can't be "most wonderful"! But that's what it often seemed like.

From Kathy Leighton, historian, to Greg Badal, contractor, the stream of incredible individuals flowed in front of my computer in an unending line. Even now I can hardly believe some of the interesting things I learned about and the interesting people I met.

Bill Weber painted murals on buildings for a wealthy landowner who had been a kid selling firecrackers when he first saw Bill in practice. Jenny Floravita and Peggy Magovern are warm unpretentious people who create images of surpassing beauty.

Ramen Spears stepped on a land mine in Iraq and took a picture of his footprint outlining the unexploded mine.

Baseball heroes and movie stars used to travel to the East County to enjoy the Byron Hot Springs.

In the year 1841, the first immigrant train to arrive in the State of California ended up in Brentwood.

Artist for the Grateful Dead, Stanley Mouse, told the story that when Janice Joplin auditioned for Big Brother and the Holding Company, neighbors called the police thinking that a woman was being murdered.

When Chief Davies came to town the number of police reports per week was an effective zero. Now the number of police reports has passed 25 per day.

Howard Sword and Gina Rozenski have plans for Brentwood that will revitalize the City almost beyond imagination.

Kathy Leighton's East County roots go back five generations. Her family owned land that became Byron Airport.

Sara Tamayo is a first-class chef, and, with husband Jeff, manages the vineyards and beautiful Villa of Ca'na Vineyards, named after the site of a biblical miracle.

J. Douglas Adams went through the Brentwood School District, himself, before becoming the Superintendent of Brentwood Public Schools fifteen years ago. He and his predecessor, Bill Bristow, have served in that office for a total of 38 years.

Meredith Nunn is only 38 years old and has been "The Farmer's Daughter" on her own farm for half of her life.

The H.A.L.O. animal rescue organization has ninety volunteers working on behalf of needy pets in East County.

Shelly MacMahon gave me a taste of a leaf from her herb garden that was sweeter than sugar.

And who could forget David Watt's hilarious and sometimes moving adventures in driving a pet ambulance?

Who could have imagined the passion and history that the Knolls, Courchesnes, Meredith Nunn, the Tachellas, and the Hobarts brought to their East County Farms?

Or that we could have skydivers and jet planes at our little Byron Airport? Or a Someday Ranch Rodeo?

I could write a shelf of books about the people I've met and the facts that I've learned since that first issue of our magazine.

And for future issues we are working with people who are just as interesting and on stories that are as exciting as these.

How it Began
Our 110° Magazine was started by three out-of-work people, who were free to set out on a new pursuit.

Richard learned the publishing trade in his native Austria. He has worked for monthly, weekly, and daily magazines such as Format Magazine and News Magazine, two of Austria's biggest media groups and affiliates of the German Bertelsmann Group. He came to the US four years ago and worked on several publications centered on the hi-tech industry until the dot-bomb explosion put him out of work.

One of our photographers, Brad Shifflett, had a similar experience. He was a network system manager who lost his job a couple of years ago. My background is technical writing. I worked most recently for Lucent Technology and lost my job almost the same time everyone else did in the messy implosion that nearly destroyed the company.

For people like the three of us, being laid off is tougher than working. Sending out resumes and scanning the Internet for job openings is such a drag! So when Richard came up with the idea of a local life-style magazine and needed a photographer and an Editor In Chief, we concluded that this was a heaven-sent opportunity.

I still believe this was a heaven-sent opportunity even though it has been a lot of work.

Many wonderful things have happened that were completely out of our control. A woman stopped by once and said, "I saw the sample pages of the magazine you guys are bringing out. This is such a great thing that I want to help you out and I don't even care if I get paid, or not!"

That person was Sheryl Lindroos, who went on to become our first Advertising Manager. Her intelligence and enthusiasm are two of the reasons we made it through the first year.

People who Help Make us Good
Bill Weber has spent many hours helping us create wonderful "Art Encounter" columns. Craig Rogers helped us with his amazing "In the Garage" columns.

Cindy Ehling keeps doing her "New Around Town" column, which we know some people look for from issue-to-issue.

Sara Tamayo has been doing her "Cooking up a Storm" column, demonstrating her elegant recipes.

All of these columnists have been serving the magazine without remuneration. They do this just for the love of 110° Magazine—just because they believe in what we are trying to do.

Dawn Marie Sable has been selling advertising with an enthusiasm that amazes us all.

Michelle Rowe maintains such a positive attitude that makes it difficult for potential advertisers to tell her no.

Adam Nation is our designer who creates the beautiful ads in the pages of 110° Magazine. We don't know which is more remarkable—that Adam comes up with such incredibly great-looking ads or the fact that he does almost every one of them by himself.

Rae Huntington, my wife, is the head of the magazine's copyedit team and is our bookkeeper. She has a tremendous capacity for managing details, which makes her effective in both capacities.

Karen Lyles and her son, Ben, come to our monthly copyediting sessions. Not only do they both volunteer their time, Karen brings coffee and donuts for the whole crew.

Jackie Cuneo from Little Jackie Paper is the press consultant who has worked with each of our issues over the past year, managing the details of color registrations and accuracy, ensuring that the quality of our magazine makes it into the final printed version.

Dave and Mary Piepho provide continual encouragement just because they think the magazine is so wonderful.

What Readers Say
People in the community are recognizing the quality of our magazine. Chief Davies once told us that he likes to show our magazine to people from other areas as a sign of East County's growth and advancement as a quality place to live.

A woman recently told us that she received her copy of 110° and stood at her sink to read to a stopping point before starting her family's breakfast. She said that breakfast was really late because she just stood there reading and reading. "I never got to a good stopping point," she said.

Readers' responses to the magazine quality create enthusiasm for our staff. Our confidence in our product boosts our passion for the work. I count myself fortunate every day because of the great people I meet and the great articles that their stories so often turn into.

The high quality of the magazine boosts the efforts and the spirits of our sales staff, as well. One of our sales reps, Morgan Aiello, for example, talks in glowing terms of the reactions of many of the potential advertisers whom she approaches.

"It seems that everybody I talk to tells me how great the magazine is," she said. "So many of them tell me that they read it from cover-to-cover. ŒI even like to read the advertisements,' some of them say—which makes me feel good, of course."

Morgan said that people have told her that they put the latest issue of 110° Magazine out when people come to visit.

Some people have told us they display all the back issues on their coffee tables—fanning them out like a fancy decoration.

They not only keep them, but they keep reading them, apparently. On August 23, for example, we got an email from a reader in response to our article on the John Marsh House restoration project. That article was a year old. We know that such affection for our magazine makes the job of selling advertising easier. Even when they can't take out an ad right away, potential clients often tell our reps that if they had the funds we would be on the top of their list."

"I feel confident in the magazine," Morgan said. "I'm excited. 110° will go far. People will never stop reading it."

Bringing it All Together
Our Publisher, Richard Koscher, is fascinated by the fact that he and Arnold Schwarzenegger both came from Austria to America, both settled in California, and one year ago they both embarked on an adventure against high odds.

Richard started both a magazine and a baby in the same year. His wife gave birth to little Ella Maria on August 31.

Richard was so impressed by Arnold's pushing of California business that he moved the printing from the press in Oregon that we had been using to a Sacramento press. Now we're doing our part in spending California dollars in California.

And here's another great thing Richard and I think about: When people in the street find out we're associated with the magazine, they often say to us, "I just love to get 110° Magazine! I read it cover-to-cover!" And "I'm so glad you guys are doing that magazine. I look forward to getting it!" And "I love your magazine! Keep up the great work!"

We ask ourselves sometimes, "How many people have a job that, when they finish whatever it is they are doing, people reward them with comments like that?" We've all worked at tasks in which we do the best work we can simply to keep the boss from hollering at us—or firing us.

We've been so gratified by the community support we have received over the past twelve months! Our number of subscriptions and the number of advertisers both grow month-by-month.

We're embarking on this second year with unbounded enthusiasm. 110° Magazine has gotten off to a good start over the past twelve months, but you really haven't seen anything yet!