ORIGINAL: Red Scholefield
Sending each member his copy of Model Aviation costs the AMA a heck of lot more than $6.50/year. The question that has to be asked is how much would it save the AMA and how much of this saving could be passed on to members that don't want the magazine.
Your $6.50 number is probably what it cost each member to subsidize the magazine for a year, taking into consideration printing and mailing costs. Now throw in AMA headquarters salaries and benefits, income from advertising, etc. and what kind of a picture do we really have? It wouldn't take a financial genius to figure this out. It would take a investigative genius to get the actual figures necessary to make a decision however.
Source: 2003 Financial Statement posted on the Members Only Section on the AMA page
Page 3
Unrestricted Net Assets Revenue
Model Aviation Advertising $851,032
Model Aviation Subscriptions $ 79,134
Total Revenue from MA (calculated) $930,166
Page 16
SCHEDULES OF MODEL AVIATION MAGAZINE DIRECT COSTS (Broken out so you can see each area of cost)
Total Costs $1,900,641
Net Loss (calculated) $ 970,475
Divide by approximate number of subscriber members of AMA in 2003 (150,000?) gives just under $6.50 per member. Yes, it is the amount subsidized, but, it does include the costs of producing the magazine including editorials and staff.
Also note that the revenue from advertising is $851,032 and the cost of that advertising is $771,740 for a net from advertising of $70,292 or about 9% net revenue on advertising sales. A better question might be how to improve the “profit” margin on advertising sales.
If you reduce the number of issues produced and sent, the fixed costs remain the same and it might well cost more to subsidize MA.
In any case, how much would it cost to send a 15 page newsletter? 50 cents a month, including postage? That includes expensing the costs of writing it to MA, but, what the hay? Where is the savings? Its gonna cost more to keep track of who gets what. The other expenses should not change to any extent.