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With a magazine rolling off the presses in Kansas this month and the team hard at work on new magazines in Texas and Tennessee launching this winter, the number of print magazines launched by Pioneer in the last two years climbs to 11.
In September, Pioneer worked with SCTelcom in Anthony, Kansas, to launch Hometown Connections magazine, followed by the upcoming inaugural issue of the Bits and Bytes magazine coming in November for Wes-Tex Telephone Cooperative in Stanton, Texas.
“I think it’s a great piece of content and our communities are loving it,” said Paige Hermes, business solutions manager at SCTelcom.
The growth in print magazines led to a record production run of more than 1.5 million editions Pioneer published in September, helping utilities tell their stories from inside the Arctic Circle in Alaska to the Florida Keys.
“We are happy with how the first edition turned out,” echoed Wendy Crenner, director of marketing and brand awareness at SCTelcom. “I’ve had several friends and family comment on how nice the magazine is. We also had a business customer approach one of our employees about an upgrade due to an article in the magazine. A win!”
The new magazines for the two telecommunication cooperatives cap off a strong run of magazine print growth over the past two years. Since late 2023, Pioneer also helped launch print magazines for:
- Lakeview Light & Power, a consumer-owned utility in Washington
- Seven municipal utilities in Tennessee
- PSC Fiber, a telecommunications cooperative in Indiana
These additions come on the heels of magazine launches for Orcas Power & Light Cooperative in Washington (read the case study), Cloverland Electric Cooperative in Michigan, and other municipal utilities in Tennessee earlier in the decade.
Morristown Utilities General Manager Jody Wigington, who started an edition of Tennessee Connections in 2023, called his printed magazine “the most effective avenue” for reaching his 15,000 customers.
“The customer engagement has made a positive impact to better build our relationship with those we serve,” he said in a recorded interview.
The magazine launches for these utilities and broadband providers come at a time when postage costs are increasing, as are worries over paper tariffs. But they are also rolling out at a moment when consumers are also facing a crisis in confidence related to online information due to the rise of artificial intelligence.
A 2024 survey of utility members served by a sampling of Ruralite and Florida Currents magazines showed 86% of members prefer to receive news about their co-op in print, including a strong lean in that direction among younger demographics.
“Print magazines, like the ones we help utilities and broadband providers send to their members, are not only engaging, but in a sea of confusion and conflicting messages online, they carry a lot of weight in consumers’ minds,” said Pioneer CEO Michael Shepard. “The credibility that a print publication gives your message is more important than ever in a world where everyone is wondering what’s real.”
In many states like Florida, Louisiana, New Mexico, Tennessee and Pioneer’s original Ruralite territory in the Pacific Northwest, Pioneer partners with statewide associations to publish the association’s magazine or publishes a magazine where the statewide association has not traditionally published one. From time to time, Pioneer gets requests for magazine quotes from utilities in states with strong existing statewide magazines and always urges the utilities to keep working with their associations, which can offer excellent support and pricing because of the scale of members they work with. Our goal is to tell stories together by supporting and strengthening statewide efforts. That’s why our team has also consulted with statewide associations on magazine related topics and helps several utilities produce content for the local pages they contribute to their statewide magazines.
“Utility magazines have a strong tradition around the country as a critical conduit for credible information and I’m excited each month to see what our team is contributing to that tradition,” said Leon Espinoza, Pioneer’s senior vice president for content and an officer in the National Electric Cooperatives Statewide Editors Association. “The stories we help our members tell bind the utilities and broadband providers to their community as an important and trusted partner.”
Learn more about Pioneer’s print magazine solutions at pioneer.coop/publications.
About Pioneer Utility Resources
Pioneer is a not-for-profit communications and marketing cooperative based in Hillsboro, Oregon. Formed in 1956, it provides agency-style communications services to consumer-owned utilities and affiliated organizations in 46 states. Marquee products and services include 11 consumer magazine brands reaching more than 1.5 million U.S. utility households. The cooperative also provides broadband marketing, social media engagement, podcast production and custom communications services.
Pioneer owns Efficiency Services Group, which specializes in energy-efficiency program support and installation services primarily in the West, and NewsData, which publishes industry-leading, independent newsletters covering the utility sector in California and the Pacific Northwest. Pioneer is also the largest shareholder in General Pacific, a Fairview, Oregon-based electric supply company. Learn more at pioneer.coop.