Member profile: The next phase as Custom Publisher in Texas
Rodney Hand, publisher of the Addison Magazine in the North Dallas Corridor and Patron Magazine, is one savvy entrepreneur who leveraged his magazine publishing expertise into a lucrative custom publishing contract – along with the nation’s largest amateur volleyball tournament.
He started out as an ad agency with a single client.
It was the early 1990s, and Rodney Hand & Associates Marketing Communications went on to build a roster of top western wear wholesale brands, including Circle T Western Wear, Roper Footwear & Apparel, and the Western & English Manufacturers Association.
In these pre-internet days, his business consisted mostly of creating glossy ads and placing them in print publications, including a “not-so-great” trade magazine.
In a classic case of “what happens when the deer have the guns,” Hand, who had worked for a weekly in college, realized that he was steps away from converting his agency into a publishing company.
The team already included a graphic design department, had direct mail experience, and the right clients. “At least 80% of our work was print buying,” he said.
The most complicated piece was negotiating for printing and distribution for the magazine in every state in the country and putting together the mailing list of retailers nationwide.
By then, 1996, the internet was growing but still in its infancy. He purchased some lists on CD from the Dallas Center, the largest western fashion wholesale center base in New York, and tapped into his client base to cobble together a list.
The first issue of Western & English Today – about 80% of the retailers sell western wear, and the rest Eastern horsemen clothing – was published in January, 1997, and “was an immediate hit,” he said.
Hand was hooked.
He went on to publish other magazines, from International Western & English Lifestyle Market (IWE Show) to the Las Vegas Fashion Week Guide.
One client town of Addison, North of Downtown Dallas, for whom he produced events and did public relations, got interested in a magazine, too.
“The city manager said, I know you are also in the publishing business, what if we did a magazine for the area?”
So with a “very large” contract from the city, Addison Magzine, “the guide to the hottest places to wine, dine, shop and do business in Addison and the North Dallas Corridor” was born, and Hand had become a custom publisher.
“We are also able to sell advertisers, but we have a lot of constrictions as to who we can sell to. The whole idea is to keep readers dining and being entertained in the area.”
He brought on partners to start PATRON Magazine – the contemporary voice of the arts, culture, and design in Dallas and Fort Worth, followed by Spikefest, the largest amateur volleyball event in the U.S. created with an event producer he tapped from a publishing representative firm.
The agency business was the first casualty of success, however. He gave it up 20 years ago when he realized that he was the core asset.
“There is no exit strategy. I wanted to focus on properties that could purchased without me personally.”
He eventually sold Western & English today to Cowboys and Indians Magazine, which had an overlapping advertising base of large western wear wholesalers.
Today, he continues to run the custom publishing division, along with Patron, and Spikefest.
While the road to get here looks circuitous, all the businesses were the result of “convergence,” Hand said. “They validated what we were already doing.”
