In a multimillion-dollar campaign, Rodale unveils Organic Style
People who care about the environment but also want to enjoy it are the target audience for the magazine, founded by Maria Rodale
Rodale Press will spend $3 million on direct mail this year to help launch its new title, Organic Style.
A 1.5-million-piece prospecting effort rolls out this fall, one of two major campaigns planned for the magazine this year in addition to several hotline mailings.
Earlier 250,000-piece tests were mailed to portions of Rodale’s 25-million-name database to test price, offer and copy.
The Emmaus, PA-based publisher is happy with results of the tests so far, which also targeted a number of beauty and fashion, catalog and book buyer lists as well as nonprofit donor files.
The April test pulled a 10% response and the August test was expected to match those numbers, typical response rates for the company’s house file.
Rodale vice president Nancy Small notes that the company was surprised by the results of an in-book survey in the preview issue. The publisher initially thought its prime target audience would be older baby boomers who came of age in the 1960s, when organic lifestyles first became popular. However, the survey showed the median age of the overwhelmingly female (85%) readership was only age 39, and that readers ranged in age from 18 to 24, and throughout the boomer years.
The recent test packages all compete against a control package that arrives in a square, green 9-by-9 inch envelope sporting the cover line, “Discover the Art of Living in Balance.” Inside is a four-page letter from founding editor and family heir Maria Rodale, who conceived the idea of the magazine. Also enclosed are a postage-paid business reply card and a promotional brochure.
Online Cultivation
Organic Style is also being promoted through the Web sites of such sister magazines as Organic Gardening, Runners World, Mountain Bike, Bicycling, Scuba Diving, Men’s Health and Prevention.
Inbound telemarketing is also performing well for the magazine. Last month, 1,000 new subscriptions were called into the company’s inbound call center in just four days.
“If this keeps up, maybe we won’t need the mail,” Small quips.
Organic Style also claims an advertising rate base of 400,000 that it hopes to move up to half a million by next March, she says.
Fertile Ground
A yearly subscription is $14.95 and the magazine — which has a newsstand cover price of $3.50 — is generally aimed at people who care about the environment but also want to enjoy it. Organic Style runs features about organic foods and health as well as beauty, fashion, the home, travel, yoga, spirituality, architecture and gardening.
While the magazine may be seeking new subscribers among its Organic Gardening readers, it isn’t trying to be the same sort of niche publication, Small notes. With the rapid growth of the organic foods market — 20% per year, according to Rodale research — it’s no wonder the company thinks the soil is fertile for Organic Style.
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