COMPANY: My Company and Product

The Company and the Concept – My Company will take of form of an LLC because of its flexibility. It’s a private limited company which means I’ll have the pass-through taxing of a partnership with the limited liability of a corporation.

I discovered the concept for The Radar magazine because I noticed a gap in the market while making media buys for the local area. I was also receiving some political push back because we were not placing enough buys in publications target to minorities. In my efforts to correct this situation – I search for a high quality publication targeting affluent members of the minority community; I could not find a publication that meets my needs. Even though I have to great idea the company is still in the idea and research stage. Working towards my MSE degree is forcing me to make progress with my venture.

The Radar’s mission is to provide an upscale general interest magazine for minorities with a local flavor in the North Central Florida area. Our main objective is to give a choice to advertisers for readers who are seeking the American dream.

The unique value proposition is that The Radar is the only upscale print magazine in the area that offers a local flavor and is targeted to minorities. The position offers value to the customer as well the businesses who are seeking to place their ads in such a publication. In additional to the printed publication, The Radar will also offer a website and a mobile app. 

Our product is a quarterly upscale, standard sized, high-gloss magazine with 110 – 125 pages; the magazine will target minorities in the North Central Florida area. 

The Radar is a non-paid circulation, meaning there is no cover price and it is free. This model is based on a relationship with advertisers. There will be a few paid subscriptions for home delivery at $9.99 a year; ad space will cover costs. The high circulation rate and long shelf life is the bread and butter of the magazines’ sustainably. The purpose of the magazine is to get ads to customers. The secondary focus is content. Without ads there is no content. The appearance of the magazine plays a major role in this service. If the magazine is not upscale it will not reach the affluent members of the black community. The circulation has to be wide spread otherwise the advertisers will not participate. The ad revenues pay the costs of the entire concern. The business location plays a major role, since this area does not have a publication of this sort; but other cities already have this type of publication.

The primary target audience for the magazine is female minorities within a five mile radius of the Alachua County area including African Americans, Asians and Hispanics, who are college educated and aged 25 to 65 with an income of more than $50,000.  The Radar Magazine will create value for readers by providing information and ideas on ways to solve problems. The quarterly magazine will offer value to businesses by providing them with a venue to get their ads before an upscale African American/minority audience.   

This is a diagram of the depth and breadth of The Radar’s product/service mix and the expected revenue. 

In considering possible drawbacks, we know that various markets grow at different rates over a period of time; we are not sure of the rate of growth for this local magazine market, which means that we are not certain how long the window of opportunity will be open because others could be working to bring a similar publication to market as we speak. It can take a great  deal of time to really determine if a new venture will be a success or failure and this venture is a little more complicated because it’s a quarterly publication; so the length of time to complete and repeat the process is much more than for a daily publication.