Twenty-year newsletter veteran enjoys her most successful launch in wake of September 11. (Publisher Profile).

"It's the most successful startup newsletter I've seen in my nearly 20 years in the business," said Lisa Anthony-Price of Winchester, Virginia-based Success Publishing & Media LLC about Growing in Faith, a newsletter she launched last fall aimed at Catholic churches to reproduce in quantity for their parishioners.

Anthony-Price founded her company almost a year ago (April 2001) intending to publish "reproducible newsletters" in the general format she learned at Resources for Educators, where she had been publisher and which did the same thing for the education market.

Her first venture on her own was Worklife Success, aimed at corporations and filled with editorial material aimed at making employees more effective. The launch results were good, she said, but flattened out dramatically after 9/11. "In the present economic situation, I guess companies are less interested in making their employees happy than in just whether they will be able to keep them on the payroll."

That newsletter title, she said, is now in a "maintenance mode" while she concentrates on Growing in Faith.

Right product for the times

Crowing in Faith may be the right product for the times. "There's plenty of competition," Anthony-Price said, "for publications aimed at giving better sermons or improving church management, but relatively little directly for the parishioners at a time when people are searching for spirituality."

She continued, "People think the Catholic Church is rich, and 'it" may be, but the local parishes are not. With the shortage of vocations, priests are doubling and tripling up. There's less 'stability' than in other denominations. Priests move about every six years at the whim of the bishop. Growing in Faith provides something they can offer their flock in straitened circumstances.

Asked how she homed in on this particular topic for a newsletter, she replied that when the September 11 attacks took place "our pastor was out of town when the attacks took place and the rectory phone was ringing off the hook, with people wanting a special prayer service or special counseling.

"When I saw how beleaguered the priests were, I thought I might have the germ of an idea. Within three days, I had written a prototype and sent it out to several hundred priests for their opinions. The response was pretty overwhelming."

She added, "My background as a Catholic doesn't play a big role in the production of the newsletter. I approach it like a journalist. Each piece in the newsletter has at least three sources; the feature on Scripture has six. I have an editorial advisory board that helps supply topics and reviews content for relevance and accuracy. I keep my personal opinions out of it because if it isn't orthodox, the pastors aren't going to buy it."

Capitol Publications

Anthony-Price came into the newsletter business nearly 20 years ago, joining Capitol Publications as a product manager from an advertising agency background just when Allie Ash had acquired the company from founder Ken Calloway. She stayed nine years, rising to marketing director, before moving to Newsletter Services (both in the Washington area) as publisher.

After leaving Newsletter Services, she launched her own venture as a marketing and publishing consultant. "I absolutely hated being a consultant. I would rather chew glass than do that again for a living," she said.

It was at that time that she took the position as publisher for Resources for Educators.

Last year that firm was acquired by Aspen Publishers and Anthony-Price again went out on her own. "I did it because I was tired of getting laid off. Success Publishing is a classic newsletter start-up. I used the bonus I received for directing the sale of the company as start-up funds. I work in my dining room. My 'staff' work out of their dens or kitchens or whatever. My husband handles the fulfillment. I put the checks in the bank and answer the phone.

"A priest called one day with some questons and when I identified myself, he said, 'You're the publisher.' 'Yes,' I said, 'and I'm also the customer service manager and I clean the bathrooms.'

"'I understand completely,' he answered. 'I take out the garbage.

Anthony-Price said they "have made profit in our first year of operation and I know how unusual that is for start-ups."

Marketing

"Our marketing is strictly direct mail," Anthony-Price said, "and fairly basic because, for the first time in my career, I'm spending my own money, not 'the publishers' money.'

"We send a package with a 'hand-addressed' outer carrier, with a short, handwritten teaser. Inside, a two-page letter, a personalized sample issue (that means with the name of the parish and the priest on the newsletter), a flier, and a reply card.

"Part of the success we're having may be that, in this over-saturated-by-direct-mail country, the local parish priest may well get less of it in his mailbox than most of us."

Note: This sounds like a place where the inclusion of a sample is appropriate. Anthony-Price isn't selling "business intelligence" or "the more successful business you will run once you have this information," but rather the actual, physical product. It may be valuable to have the prospect be able to hold the newsletter in his hands, to see what it looks and feels like (and it certainly can't hurt to see his name and parish on it).

In her market, Anthony-Price said, much involvement for "the internet" is probably about five years away. By that time, many or most churches may have their own web sites. The priests may rotate, but the staff are "permanent." "They're lay people these days," Anthony-Price observed, "and that's where the pressure for change will come from."

The future

"I'm launching an ancillary service this spring," Anthony-Price said, "and another newsletter in this area in August. I hope they're even half as successful. I think the lesson here is to let the market speak. While the idea came out of a need I thought the market had, the confirmation and editorial content came directly from the priests and lay Catholics themselves. It seems as if the companies riding out this tough time are the ones smart enough and flexible enough to respond to their market."

149 Magic Mountain Road, Winchester, VA 22602. 540-877-3671. fax [phone], [e-mail].

RELATED ARTICLE: Interesting facts about Winchester, Virginia, home of Success Publishing & Media

1. Town changed hands 17 times during the Civil War, more than anywhere else.

2. Country music legend Patsy Cline ("Crazy") is buried there, with a simple marker carrying only her largely unknown married name.

3. It's the site of the annual Shenandoah Valley Apple Blossom Festival--highlighted by the crowning of the Apple Blossom Queen (one of whom turned your reporter down for a date, even though we both worked for a newsletter publisher at the time).