Hey guys, remember our big “Vote for Coilhouse” effort from about week ago? Well, the three finalists have been announced, and unfortunately, we weren’t selected, despite your incredible feat of getting us into the top 10 out of over 4,000 nominees in under 24 hours with your votes. The finalists are Sacred Wind Communications (a telecom company), Beacon Paint & Hardware (I was excited when I originally misread this as “BACON PAINT”) and Happybaby organic baby foods. We wish them all the best during the remainder of the competition.
Actually, this is a huge relief. For the past week, we’ve all been kind of second-guessing ourselves every time we made a blog post, asking: “is this too risqué? Should we go easy with the gross/weird stuff, just this week, to avoid scaring the judges away from picking us as a finalist?” For some, the pressure was too great: Ross kept writing and deleting draft after draft until he just snapped, covering the walls of his office with writing in feces.
Now that all the suspense is over, it’s a huge relief to feel like we can write about anything we want (which most of us ended up doing last week anyway) without feeling any apprehension or guilt. Anything I personally might’ve felt too cautious to blog about last week, I will blog about in my next few posts, with interest! I kick off this trend with a song by one of our great heroes, Bob Flanagan, from Kirby Dick’s documentary Sick. If you don’t know who Mr. Flanagan was, the song explains it all. Much more about Bob Flanagan at a later date.
In the end, grant or no grant, we’ll make it. It would’ve been easier and faster with that funding, but we learned through this “Vote for Coilhouse” experience that we have something more valuable than any amount money that any large company could bestow upon us: a caring, kind, loyal group of friends & readers that was willing to support us when we asked for help. Also, we got a brief taste of what it’s like to feel beholden to a large company for any kind of support, and we did not like that feeling at all. We don’t need them to make it; we just need you guys. Thank you, all, from the bottom of our hearts.
Folks, this is just a courtesy post to let you know that our closing date for receiving Small Business ads has been moved from September 15th to September 30th. So all you stragglers who have been meaning to get your ads in, but haven’t gotten the chance to – you have one more week! Please email us to reserve your ad space. No ads will be accepted after September 30th, because we have to get Issue 04 out the door.
For those of you hearing about this opportunity for the first time, this is Coilhouse’s way of promoting small businesses in our pages by providing prominent, full-color ad space for as low as $99-149 a pop, depending on how many issues you commit to in advance. In addition to our returning advertisers from Issue 03, our new crop of Issue 04 advertisers is looking very eclectic already: it includes a swimsuit calendar inspired by Butoh, an Etsy seller of vintage-inspired capelets and scarves, and a music label of genre-crossing electronica. Join them in getting the word out about your endeavor!
We’re SO stoked for Zo today! After a year in aesthetic stasis, her personal website, Biorequiem, has finally relaunched with a gorgeous new look. Our favorite cosmonomad is a busy bee; she barely has time to initiate her patented Zobogrammatronicambient energy battery recharge system, let alone find a spare moment to whip up sexy new design and code, so she enlisted Nubby Twiglet (our awesome Coilhouse Indie Ad Grid designer) and Star St. Germain to help her. And now the proud mama crows “here it is – hussied up, blushing and ready to be sent out center stage with a brisk slap on the ass.” Huzzah.
You’ll find all sorts of goodies at Biorequiem 5.0. Art! Photography! Illustration! Memoirs! Bewbz! Chihuahuas! Anthropomorphic cybercows! Go get some.
UPDATE: We did it! Together! We made it into the Top 10. Now, we wait ’til the 24th to find out if we’re selected as one of the finalists. Thank you to everyone who stepped up at the last minute to make a difference.
First off, thank you, all, for your incredible support. We’re currently at 355 votes, placing us only 100 or so votes shy of breaking into the Top 10 (out of 3,994 nominees!). Not bad for being in the competition for less than 12 hours, eh? Most of the businesses in the Top 10 registered on the site back in August, whereas we only found out about this contest yesterday. All we can say is: wow. Thank you.
There are 2 hours left to vote. In those 2 hours, we want to make it to the Top 10. We’re almost there! After midnight ET, it’s in the hands of the judges, who will choose 3 finalists. They’re not necessarily going to be looking at this as a popularity contest; it’s more about the story that each business has to tell. Even though it’s not a numbers game at that point, being at the top will certainly help us catch the judges’ eye. That’s why we’re asking any stragglers who haven’t yet voted for Coilhouse to help us win.
Again, the steps take less than 60 seconds (Tequila timed it, says it took him only 41 seconds)
STEP ONE: click here to register as a voter on the site. We know, registration is super-annoying. This one’s petty painless, actually. Just a few fields. Don’t worry about spam – they explicitly say “we will not solicit your email for special offers, product news or other communications.”
STEP TWO: click here to view our entry on the site. On this site, click on the blue button on the left sidebar with the words “Support This Story, ENDORSE NOW.” And that’s it. You’re done!
Thank you again, guys, for all your support. It’s been wonderful watching this story spread on Facebook and Twitter. We’ve almost there – let’s close the gap!
We will return to your regularly scheduled Coilhouse programming on Monday.
But even if it gets cut off at midnight, judges aren’t going to go for the most popular contestants, necessarily. There are tons of businesses that have more votes than us that just aren’t interesting or classy enough to get chosen as a finalist. Like that laser tag place that just got knocked out of the top 10.
They’re also looking at how long each contestant has been in the competion. Almost ALL of the contestants in the top 10 were the very, very first to register. You can tell by their ID number in the URL compared to ours. The judges are going to know that they got that many votes over the course of 3 week, and we got 1/3rd of that in a DAY, that we have potential.
Esteemed Coilhaüsers, we need your help. Each and every one of you. It’s important. We’ve entered Coilhouse into a competition for small businesses. The winning prize is a $100,000 grant, and we need your vote. We’re pretty pragmatic when it comes to any sort of contests or sweepstakes, but in the off chance that we win this thing, it would enable us to do things with this magazine that we’ve only dreamed about. We’re already imagining some responsible ways we could spend that money… such as making every subsequent issue of Coilhouse scratch-and-sniff.
The competition is called Shine a Light, and it’s sponsored by American Express and NBC. The goal of the competition is to “recognize an inspiring small business.” We feel that Coilhouse deserves to win, and in order to make that happen, we need your vote. Your support matters!
In order to help us, you need to take two short steps. Both steps can be completed in under 60 seconds (promise – we timed it). Register (they won’t spam you) and vote (it takes 1 click).
STEP ONE: click here to register as a voter on the site. We know, registration is super-annoying. This one’s petty painless, actually. Just a few fields. Don’t worry about spam – they explicitly say “we will not solicit your email for special offers, product news or other communications.”
STEP TWO: click here to view our entry on the site. On this site, click on the blue button on the left sidebar with the words “Support This Story, ENDORSE NOW.” And that’s it. You’re done!
NOTE: We just discovered that there’s no way that people from another country can enter. So for you guys, we introduce the bonus step (can be followed by Americans as well).
BONUS ROUND: If you really, REALLY want to support us and take one extra step, get the word out! Let people know we need support. Post this link on Facebook, Twitter, your blog, or whatever: http://coilhouse.net/2009/09/help-coilhouse-win-a-small-business-grant/
The 60 seconds you take to support Coilhouse will make a world of difference to us. Suggestions for our first scratch-and-sniff issue flavor are welcome in the comments.
This is just a housekeeping post to let you know that the Coilhouse page has been updated. We’ve changed the look of the buttons at the top of the site, and added two new links. The first is a proper button for our shop (where shirts, stickers and Issue 03 are still available!) and the second is a link to our updated Coilhouse FAQ. The FAQ covers both the magazine and the blog.
We’ve also put up a FAQ for potential small business advertisers! This program was a hit in Issue 03, and we want to thank all the indie businesses who took the plunge and placed an ad. The advertisers we ended up with were very diverse, but all appropriate to Coilhouse; to give you a range, Issue 03’s ads included a music label, a shop of rare books, a company that makes Victorian-inspired clothing, and a gal who makes monster jewelry/soap. The PDFs of the final ad pages that appeared in Issue 03 can be found below:
As of this time, we’re ready to begin accepting ads for Issue 04. The closing date for Issue 04 advertising is September 15th. This leaves you guys with some time to book an ad, but please note that ads are placed into the magazine in the order in which they were received, which means that the earliest-booked ads end up on the most prominent pages! So if you’re interested in advertising in Coilhouse, now’s the time to review the advertising FAQ and email Nadya if interested. Thank you!
Posted by Coilhouse on August 18th, 2009
Filed under Coilhouse | Comments Off on CH Mini-Makeover and Shoutout to Our Supporters
July 31st: untold years into the future. The incept date of a mysterious being known in this dimension as Zoetica Ebb. Deep in the dank, aromatic depths of the Coilhouse Catacombs, we’d all been wracking our brains as to how to best celebrate another year of the glorious Zobogrammatron’s dalliance in our own space/time.
We know she likes shiny baubles. And pure electricity. And raw meat. So, for weeks, we all pooled our modest resources, collecting them in a special porcine receptacle with the intention of taking Z out for sushi tonight, followed by dancing and Jacob’s Ladder-licking at the Edison Lounge. Also, Nadya and I spent countless nights sneaking away to a top secret, tucked-away laboratory alcove of the Catacombs. Combining our formidable thaumaturgical and soldering skills, we crafted a Rundell Tiara facsimile from unclassifiable, glittering glassine fragments found lining the deep crater in Siberia where Zoetica was said to be discovered.
The ominous crown was finally completed in the wee hours of this very morning. So very proud we were, and so very tired, we forgot to engage the Catacomb’s alarm system before passing out cold in our cots. Or to feed Ross Rosenberg (our brilliant but pathologically ill associate whose cage office is also located here) his daily can of uncooked Spaghettios.
A few hours later, we were awakened by the sound of maniacal cackling. Rushing into the central chamber, we caught a glimpse of Ross clambering out of the jimmied escape hatch with our piggy bank tucked under one arm and the precious Doom Tiara perched askew upon his malformed cranium. “I’M A PRETTY PRETTY PRINCESS. SAY IT!”
“Yes, Ross! You are! You’re the prettiest princess in all the land! Please, just put down the pig!”
“NO. I’M GOING TO SPEND IT ALL ON WHIPPETS AND PTERODACTYL PORN AND THERE’S NOTHING YOU CAN DO TO STOP ME. MOOHOOHAHAHAHAHA.”
“Ross! Nooooooooo!”
“SEE YOU IN HELL!!” With that, he slammed the escape hatch shut, leaving us bereft in the moldering darkness. But let it never be said that we are not resilient, resourceful gals. At the very last minute, through the magic of some hastily cooked up bathtub MDMA, Ross’s discarded balloon stash, and the Craigslist strippergram directory, we are still going to be able to observe Zoetica’s special day with an appropriate degree of sexiness and aplomb.
First of all, Coilhouse is going international! The three of us have been operating out of California for the past two years, but as of August, we’ll be releasing our spores across three different continents. Nadya’s job is moving her to London, and Mer is traveling to New Zealand to fulfill her lifelong dream of becoming a professional hobbit-fluffer. Meanwhile, Zo shall continue to oversee our sinister stateside operations from her sooper seekrit LA lair.
Die Nachthexen. Hat-tip to Suzanne G of Wurzeltod.
Coilhouse readers attending Nerd Prom (aka the San Diego Comic-Con) have one last chance see us all in one place at the same time at the Avatar Press booth before we scatter to the winds. It’s actually quite fitting that our final meeting is at Comic-Con, seeing as that’s where the three of us met face-to-face for the first time two years ago. We’ll be signing and selling copies of Issue 03. Below are the specifics:
Where: San Diego Comic-Con, booth #2701 (front of the 2700 isle, by the front doors).
When: Saturday, July 25
What time: 12 to 1 PM
Also, Mer is going to be performing some tunes with her old friend Amanda Palmer at the big CBLDF fundraising concert on Friday night in San Diego. Click here for details. Hope to see you there!
Holy schnikies! This has been by far the most overwhelming first day of magazine sales we’ve eover had. Thank you to severyone who ordered a shirt, magazine or sticker so far. Wow.
Okay, two notes about shipping
Firstly. Everyone, please check your PayPal invoice to make sure you remembered to enter the correct shipping address, and that the precious order is not about to be sent to someplace you used to live. For whatever reason, PayPal makes it easy to overlook the important step of choosing the correct address to ship to. Don’t let it happen to you! If you need us to fix your address, email Gretta ASAP.
Secondly. A note from Gretta, our lovely shipping extraordinaire: “Hello Coilhouse Magazine Lovers, it warms my ventricles to see so many returning customers and I am delighted at the sight of hundreds of new customers from around the world. This is great because this means there will be an Issue 04! This also means that some of you who ordered on the 16th, your magazines may not be shipped until as late as Wednesday, so please kindly exercise a little patience, as it is just me doing the label printing, order filling and post office deliveries. This is not a cry for pity, just a heads up. If you must must MUST have it shipped sooner, send me an email and you’ll be bumped to the top. Gotta run, lots of work to do to get your goodies to you! Lovies, Gretta”
Regular posting will resume shortly. Thank you again, everyone!
The shop is now open! Issue 03, the stickers, and the shirts are up for grabs (note: the shirts have already been printed, and are available to ship immediately).
With our past two print issues, we were content to take a couple of snapshots of the best-designed articles and show them off on the blog in hopes of enticing you to buy a copy. This time around, attempting to choose select images from our newest issue is proving to be painfully difficult. Thanks largely in part to our phenomenal creative director, Courtney Riot, each and every article had a design personality so strong, it’s clamoring to represent Issue 03. What to choose, what to omit…
Eh, screw it, this ain’t Sophie’s Choice! It’s late. We’re giddy and delirious. Let’s throw caution to the wind, yes? FULL MONTY, baby. After the cut, a tantalizing, low-res glimpse at all the articles in our latest issue. Enjoy.
