Home Furniture Mazazine

Re: Home Furniture Mazazine

Hank Knight

Congrats! Great find. I'm not familiar with Home Furniture Magazine. I need to look it up.

Indeed

Bill Houghton, Sebastopol, CA

If I had to reduce my too many magazines stored in the attic (not the best location, but not a big house), Home Furniture would be among the last to go. Simple concept: pictures of a piece of furniture with discussions of the design process and ideas; no "how to" at all. Alas, not enough people discovered the gold in those pages.

Re: Home Furniture Mazazine

Derek Cohen (in Perth, Australia)

Bill, I bought a complete set some years ago. Absolutely treasure the magazines and re-read them. I am at a complete loss as to why they discontinued the best woodworking magazine ever (possibly including Woodwork)!

Regards from Perth

Derek

Volume 1 a winner- editors, why did it fail?

Bill Tindall, E.Tn.

The first article in Volume 1 by Becksvoorth is titled "Designing a Small Cabinet. Chris takes us through his thinking of building an attractive cabinet to serve some specific purposes and fit in a confined space. The compromises of design for function were familiar to me. He traveled the same journey as I did in visually narrowing the squat cabinet that had to fit in a space- narrow stiles, no center divider. I had an advantage in that I won't have drawers inside that need to be withdrawn so my doors, and hence panels, will be more narrow.

A few pages later is a more squat corner cabinet than the one I am planning with an hexagonal dovetailed drawer. To quote the author's comments on the drawer, " after chopping a few dozen mitered dovetails, I started questioning my decision....". Stay tuned to see how this part comes out.

This treasure failed and I have not seen any more Design Books past #8. What replaced these sources of inspiration? Or is the need unmet?

It is going to be hard to focus on building instead of reading with these 14 volumes of temptation at hand.

Re: Why did it fail?

CharlieL

It's not that hard to understand why. Woodworking is declining, and for good reasons, it's a thankless job.

Re: Home Furniture Mazazine

TomD

Partly because some people don't copy. Not a dis, but there are people who do their own stuff, and it can be as simple as driven by their environment. Of course everyone copies in some ways, but it isn't necessary to do a project, and it can be dangerous to pick and choose elements.

I started out doing all my own stuff, but then I got a house and people wanted specific pieces, so I copied things mostly. Recently I was looking for some Nakashima inspiration, and there are a lot more pics online than in books or magazines. Plus I can pull those things directly into CAD and work with them directly. I even found other people's plans online, though one has to treat those with caution.

I dropped FWW, when I knew more than most of the articles, and when they forgot their own history. I am really grateful to FWW issues in the early days for being excellent. I bought issue of HFM when it was on the stands. I think magazines today are mostly terrible.

In many areas, possibly all areas, the internet is way better than magazines, and there are many areas that never had magazines, that I am aware of. Where the internet fails is when it goes off in odd direction driven by the level of ability of people, so I don't think that for instance, the current level of internet info on woodworking technique is bad, I think it is better than magazines by a long shot, but it is pushed by often enthusiastic people trying to solve newbie problems. What are newbie objectives? Often project driven crutches. There is nothing wrong with that, just not what I am into. So for instance the obsession with edge holding is kinda a newbie thing. They figure if they could ever get that thing sharp, it better stay sharp for ever. Easy vs fast. Etc... Like obsessing over tails first vs pins first. You wouldn't be much of a woodworker if you couldn't do either. Because there are situations where you have to do either first. Or exercises that are similar. After a certain point, difficult doesn't come into it.

But in something like guitar making, none of the books are up to date, even close. The same is true of boats. There is a progressive magazine for guitar building but it is super expensive though thin on content. They have their index online. If I see something interesting, I just google it. Often the writer's own website has equivalent information, or a reprint.

Are you on youtube yet Bill?

Re: Why did it fail?

TomD

Probably a lot of things, but fundamentally it was high end with no plans or purpose other than gazing at it, when their core audience is people who build stuff, or like to think they would. If it had been slated for the furniture buyer market it would have had a hope, but then they were representing the wrong artists.

Today, people with money to buy and decorate expensively, buy mostly from designers. People who make stuff as woodworkers rarely crack the market of buyers, and often live strange places relative to the buyers. Michael Fortune who straddles both camps used to have his shop in downtown Toronto. But the cost of that kind of thing is pretty much prohibitive these days.

Low advertising income

Dick Coers

Subscriptions never keep a magazine running by themselves. Subscriber count does influence advertising, but by themselves, will provide a little percentage of profit.

Re: Volume 1 a winner- editors, why did it fail?

John in NM

I've never seen the magazine, looks like I missed out in a big way. Who published it and when?

As to why it failed, first thing to do is look at the ads. Are the products in the ads something you would buy as a reader if the magazine were still in print?

Really?

Bill Tindall, E.Tn.

Agreed that all the small cabinet shops we used to sell to are retired to be replaced by factory cabinet supply. But these shops did not subscribe to magazines.

In my life time Woodcraft, Rockler, Lee Valley, Woodworkers Supply and Klingspor have proliferate stores across N. America. They are obviously selling to an expanding number of woodworkers. Look in the back of FWW and there are classes everywhere. There are chapters of SAPFM in all the metropolitan area and these folks are cranking out Period Furniture as fine as was every made. Galleries have spring up to sell hand made wood work wherever there is a well heeled market. Lumber mills are custom grading lumber to cater to small volume buyers. It seems to me that we are in a Renaissance of woodworking.

Re: Low advertising income

Bill Tindall, E.Tn.

Volume 1- 13 pages of advertising. Volume 14- 20 pages of advertising. The data does not support your claim.

Re: Low advertising income

Dick Coers

How does that compare to Wood and Fine Wooworking? Just guessing, but I’d bet Taunton worked some good deals with FWW advertisers. Ellis would be more knowledgeable than myself. I just overheard conversations when I worked at Woodworker’s Journal. Also number of pages may have a direct relationship to high revenue. You can’t charge high rates with small subscriber numbers. Edit; I know that is a fact because that conversation came up repeatedly for the 3 years I was employed there. We could not compete with Wood Magazine. That was a huge cash generator for Meredith.

more fundamental reason....

Bill Tindall, E.Tn.

More pages of ads in Vol 14 could then mean less $$ per bdft of ad space....they do sell the space by bdft?

Then the primary reason for failure would be not enough subscribers. That could well be. I never heard of the magazine and I was certainly building stuff then....lots of stuff. I would not have a clue what the magazine was about from the title. That leaves the question of whether marketing the magazine was deficient or it fundamentally targeted too small audience.

Re: more fundamental reason....

Dick Coers

Even in the heyday of woodworking magazines, marketing and content was an incredible balancing challenge. You have to balance between educational and entertainment content. Woodworker's Journal creedo for decades was just provide plans. Well you can't get advertisers and profit like that! So it went from a newspaper format to magazine. Then glossy color magazine for the flash and subscriber appeal. Big advertisers liked the glossy color too. Especially when their machinery showed up the magazine shop photos. I was a huge fan of Tauton's effort. Not quite an original subscriber, but a very early one. When I discovered it, I ordered all the back issues. Charter subscriber to Fine Homebuilding. So I was well aware of the Home Furniture Magazine and mourned it's demise. For magazines, the old joke at staff meetings was that the article read could be no longer than the average bowel movement.

last issue explains

Bill Tindall, E.Tn.

Editorial in last issue says quitting because of insufficient market.

I wonder what was the intended market in 1995? Probably says in one of the early editorials. I usually do not read editorials. The claim is made that the content of this magazine will be carried over to FWW. Someone lost their way in route. One per issue of these in depth articles by a professional would have kept me a subscriber.

The fact that I was the only bidder at $16 including shipping suggests there still isn't much demand for this kind of content. Thankfully, there is WC, but fewer building here than one would hope.

Re: last issue explains

Bob Lang

As I recall "Home Furniture" came about due to a big response to calls for material for another "Design Book". You might look at the editorial in the first issue. That was probably the high point of the designer/craftsman/furnituremaker in terms of the number of people producing custom furniture in small independent shops.

For me the title didn't work, but I believe the intent was for the magazine to appeal both to woodworkers who aspired to that type of work and to potential customers for that work. I enjoyed the first few issues but it seemed to me that the type of articles you describe - a successful maker going through his decision making process - were replaced with more "artist statements" about design ideas. For me the good content was lost in the clouds.

The best magazines (Fine Woodworking for the first 10-15 years, American Woodworker when Ellis was there under the Rodale umbrella, and Popular Woodworking the first few years that I worked there) were good because the content was good. The content was good because the staff consisted of experienced woodworkers producing stuff they would read. The current race to the bottom is because the quality of the content is no longer important. It's "strictly business" and decisions are made by people with no idea what the craft is about or what people involved in the craft are interested in.

Publishing is a pretty goofy business and no where near as easy as it was 25 or 30 years ago. Business decisions are made for reasons that have little or nothing to do with the quality of the content, and there aren't many people left in the woodworking publishing business with the ability to tell good content from fluff. It's all about working to a formula that leaves even the best of current publications poor imitations of their former selves.

Bob Lang

Re: Why did it fail?

CharlieL

It's sad to say that for many years already this country has not been very kind to blue collar workers, a group of people that made this country great in the good old days. Made in America.

That's a hell of a twist CharlieL

thanks for insight

Ads and editorial

Ellis Walentine

Most display advertising is sold by the CPM method (cost per thousand eyeballs). so magazines with higher circ, like Wood, make more ad revenue simply by virtue of having a higher readership (subs and newsstand combined). But, ad rates vary with the cachet of the magazine, too; and the mags regarded by advertisers as best in class for their target audience get to charge a higher CPM. There are no absolute values.

Page count is almost directly related to ad volume, because of the costs of producing the magazine -- salaries, paper, mech and mailing, printing. As I recall, we usually were running about 40% ad pages and 60% editorial -- at least that was the target. If the ad salesmen sold enough ads, we could make the book bigger by adding pages incrementally, usually 8 or 16 pages at a time, since those were the increments that came off the press.

I have never understood Home Furniture's rise and fall. It was a very cool idea that appealed to folks like me (and you), but it was a bit of an orphan. I think Taunton was hoping to cross over into the buyer's side of the custom furniture marketplace, while continuing to attract custom furniture makers as well. It may have been too big a stretch, editorially and ad-saleswise to really click. I haven't analyzed page counts, but 13 to 20 pages of ads was likely too low to sustain a magazine of sufficient page count to attract an adequate subscriber base. For their part, advertisers of woodworking equipment and supplies may not have felt that the hybrid audience would buy enough of their widgets to justify high CPMs, or any ad budget at all.

All speculation, but I'm pretty sure it was economic problems that sank that magazine.

Re: more fundamental reason....

AZ in Colorado Springs

When did the publishing start and end for this magazine? If you mentioned it, I missed it.

1994 to 1998

interesting insight...thanks

Re: Why did it fail?

TomD

I would not describe most people who are into fine woodworking as "blue collar". One minimal requirement is being able to talk to your customers about why they should pay 3 grand for a one of a kind hall table. That is a skill that could sell a bond offering to a Swiss Bank any day of the week.

My daughter is into art, and I should add, is a very honest person. She is up for an art installation. She has being enjoying some Canadian art movement from maybe the 50s, that speaks to her. Totally obscure, and arier guard. She pitched her idea for line drawings done in that style to the selection committee. Currently she is in the lead, but she has to submit a budget, which is something that is hard to do for pencil drawings, and she isn't really prepared for. She has the highest marks at her college, and it is in the Harvard range of institution up here. That might be a step or two more obscure than studio furniture, but not by much.