he Cooper-Young LampLighter is currently seeking an Advertising Sales Manager.  This is a great opportunity to get involved with your local neighborhood publication and meet some amazing new people and businesses in the process!  The ideal candidate will be motivated, able to meet tight deadlines, has strong communication skills and a passion for the LampLighter.

Advertising Sales Manager Job Description

Responsibilities

• Communicate with potential advertisers on a regular basis to notify them of deadlines, special events, and advertising opportunities.
• Be knowledgeable about community events and LampLighter information (including distribution, rates, deadlines) as well as advertising opportunities available via online and email blasts
• Respond to advertiser’s emails and phone calls in a timely manner
• If comfortable, assist smaller advertisers with creating a simple ad
• In the current market, we really need some new advertisers to step up. We have our regular advertisers who routinely place an ad, but even some of them have had to scale back. We really need someone who can go “pound the pavement” so to speak and cultivate relationships with new advertisers and convince them to advertise, while maintaining a strong relationship with existing advertisers.
• Listen to the customer’s needs
• Follow up with advertisers to remind them of due dates
• Ensure that all ads are to the layout manager by deadline
• Assist with billing issues as needed
• Average hours spent per week vary. Usually quiet right after paper comes out and then ramps up to being pretty busy the week before and during publication.
• Also starting off requires a bit more time per week, just to get comfortable.

Compensation

Commission rate = 20%

If you have questions, recommendations or wish to apply, please email info@cooperyoung.org or call 901-272-2922.

By Leslie Thompson

At the beginning of every month, Cooper-Young’s newspaper finds its way to our front porches and neighborhood businesses. Maybe you see it at your door as you’re coming home for the day, or perhaps you’re out working in the yard as a kind stranger delivers it right to you. Either way, if anything is certain when living in this neighborhood, it is that a LampLighter will pass through your hands 11 times a year, as it has for the past two decades.
We all have our favorite sections. You might go straight to the book review or the society page, while others look forward to the crime map. But as you’re turning those pages, do you ever wonder how it came to be? Who made this free newspaper and how?

More than 230 hours are spent creating the LampLighter every month. By the time you receive this issue, our editor Barb Elder will have spent approximately 60 hours on this one volume, and that doesn’t account for the 40+ hours volunteers have spent writing the articles for this very same issue. The advertisements that border the articles create additional work. Kristan Huntley, our ad manager, spends over 50 hours a month procuring and coordinating those advertisements. Even the billing and collections for the ads that are sold take time. Chris McHaney spends about 12 hours doing that every month. Once all the content has been edited and the ads have been sold and created, an additional 30 hours are spent on the layout, production, and coordination of it all. After that, the LampLighter is delivered from the press to our neighborhood and its businesses, which takes more than 13 hours after each publication. Then even more time is spent by volunteers who deliver the paper door-to-door to our residents, which takes 32 people an average of 35 minutes each, approximately 19 hours in total. This figure does not even include the hours volunteers spend formatting the online edition of the paper.

The amount of time it takes to create each LampLighter might not seem so astonishing to you. Of course, behind every periodical is a staff that works hard and long to create such a thing, but when you consider that most of the hours spent to make the LampLighter are by volunteers, the time can begin to seem overwhelming, even more so when you realize that the people who actually are paid to produce this are not paid much at all. For such an important job as editing the LampLighter, Barb receives only $600 for her 60+ hours each month. And for all her time spent, Kristan receives only 20% of the revenue raised from the ads she has sold. An additional $300 is spent on layout, and the billing manager and distribution manager each receive $250 for their month’s work. The only other funds spent on each issue goes to the printing, and that costs $1,100 each issue.

Despite its seemingly low cost and free help from countless volunteers every month, the LampLighter has been losing money the last few years. And with the CYCA’s recent purchase of its building at 2298 Young, the Community Association is watching its budget and finances more closely than ever. Although the LampLighter is not at risk of going under anytime soon, now might be a good time to consider what you receive from this free publication. How would you feel if it were to disappear from your porch? Where would you go to gather news and current information about the happenings of this exciting and vibrant neighborhood? Would you be prepared to make a donation to contribute to the ongoing progress of the LampLighter? For the small business owners out there, have you ever considered advertising your business or service in this paper? If you’re not capable of making a monetary donation, could you spare some of your time to write an article or deliver a paper? Ask yourself these questions, and then ask yourself, “Where else besides Cooper-Young can I receive a free, monthly neighborhood newspaper, one that holds a 20-year-old tradition?”

Cooper-Young has been taken over by Zombies! Don’t worry, these monsters are just out for fun, read about their energy saving escapades and the Smallest User Competition in cover articles in this issue. Also inside find updates on the proposed Midtown Zoning Overlay, Midtown’s new dog park, Peabody School, and the construction on the Kroc Center. You will find articles about local art openings, book signings, theatre productions, a film series, and Jabberwocky.

By Emily Bishop

The LampLighter has grown under the leadership of many editors since the premiere issue back in 1989. Some editors have served for several years and some only a few issues. Leslie Jaynes has stepped down as editor after more than a year of service. Leslie worked to broaden the scope of articles printed in the LampLighter and brought a new energy to the task of production. We wish her well.

The search for a new editor was a brief one. Barb Elder interviewed for the job previously but realized because of her other commitments that she would not have the time necessary to do the job. The timing is right now that she is taking some time off from teaching school. Barb, along with her husband, Jason, and daughter, Violet, have lived in CY for almost four years. She is excited about the opportunity to work with the LampLighter staff and the many volunteers that work to publish the paper. This will be Barb’s first editorial endeavor but Cooper-Young has provided many firsts for her already. “This is where we bought our first home. It is where Violet took her first steps. It is where many of our close friends live. We are thankful to be in CY and we love being a part of this community,” said Barb.

The July issue will be the first issue for Barb and she will be meeting lots of new people. Each editor brings their own ideas to the paper and she is enthusiastic about the possibilities that lie ahead. Barb added, “I look forward to getting to know all of you who contribute to this paper on a regular basis. I also invite all of you writers, artists, poets, and photographers out there who have yet to share your thoughts and talents with the rest of us to please get involved. This paper serves to keep our neighborhood connected and informed and is a platform for many of our voices to be heard. What a beautiful thing to be a part of!”

LampLighter benefits from summer internship.

The CYCA has a new intern from the University of Memphis English Department. Kara Chamberlain will be working about 15 hours a week throughout the summer on several projects during her internship. In between the monthly issues of the LampLighter she will work on the CY History project, the CY Festival Friday 4-Miler, the CYCA website, and the LampLighter online.

Kara is also a new resident to CY having just moved to Manila Avenue. She plans to graduate in December and then apply to the Uof M law school.

The Lamplighter Online Edition is Finally Here

By Patrick Miller

This month there are some changes happening in the ways that we communicate with and keep you informed. For years, Cooper-Youngians have kept abreast of what’s going on in their neighborhood in the usual ways; over the fence, conversations at local establishments, nights out, and of course, the LampLighter newspaper, still hand delivered once-per-month for free to subscribers. This paper has been a constant in this community for a long time, keeping folks informed about their neighborhood, it’s relationship to greater Memphis, showcasing music and the arts and artisans, supporting local businesses and restaurants, and all written (and mostly published) by volunteers from Cooper-Young. In February the LampLighter reaches a big milestone; it’s going online! As is tradition, February will be our first issue in 2010, and our first online issue ever, but more than just an online edition of the printed paper, the “wired” edition will provide constantly changing information and dialogue on a day to day basis to a potentially even larger audience than the paper can ever hope to reach.

In addition, as a part of bringing the LampLighter Online, we’ve added some new fun and useful features to the Cooper-Young website as well. Read on for more…

What is the LampLighter Online all about?

The entire contents of the printed LampLighter newspaper will be available online either at or before the distribution of the paper version. An electronic version (PDF format) of the printed paper will also always be available via both the LampLighter and the CYCA websites. However, the online edition will not just be a digital mirror image of the printed paper; it will be much more. With the LampLighter online we will be introducing a number of new things online that will provide a more dynamic experience and more interactivity. There will be additional types of content added to the online edition, ways for you to communicate and share with other Cooper-Youngians (whether they are local or living farther afield these days), and follow-ups to stories that would normally end with the printed page. In fact, sometimes *you* may even be the person who adds the next installment of a growing story!

So what’s new?

The LampLighter introduces community discussion groups for the first time for the CYCA. Today, you can already comment on the information you find at the CYCA website, and you’ll be able to do that here as well, but we’ve taken it a step further in order to provide you with your own voice online in your community. The LampLighter will launch with discussion groups that will allow you to engage with your community on issues that matter the most to you, find out who feels the same way you do about a particular issue, or hear a perspective you hadn’t considered yet. If you already have a CYCA website account, you’ll have immediate access to all the areas of the LampLighter including the discussion groups, if not, you can sign up for an account online. Once you do, you will be able to post your own topic for input from the community, or to share valuable or fun information with the community. Comment on other members’ topics and provide your opinion, insight, or answers.

Starting in February, the LampLighter will feature blogs (“web logs,” journal-like articles) from the community. We will have both regular and guest spots for the blog section of the paper. Our online poll showed clearly that you are interested in contributing to our websites, and this is the perfect way. Got an interesting tale to tell, an issue to educate about, art to show off, or an opinion on an issue that you think is important to the Cooper-Young neighborhood? This is *your* podium!

Some stories will be carried on in the days and weeks after they are first published, allowing for follow-up even after the print edition has been read cover to cover. Stories may also take on a new life and direction as you and other members post your thoughts and provide your own additional experiences or perhaps a counterpoint to what you read online.

Life doesn’t typically move at a monthly pace… Because of the nature of online publishing, when there is news in our neighborhood, we can provide more immediate coverage of that news than we can in the monthly paper edition, as well as tie-ins to stories already published when they happen.

We will also be able to showcase images, videos, and music that we can normally only write about. Want to catch snippets of the bands from the Cooper-Young Festival, or see the winning runner cross the finish line in the Friday Festival 4 Miler, the LampLighter will bring it to you and more!

Are you a Facebook user? Use your account to login and comment and share from the LampLighter right to your Facebook stream!

Of course the things you’ve come to expect as a part of the CYCA website will all still be there as well, plus some additions we’ve recently added: coverage of CYCA issues, meetings, concerns, events, safety, classifieds, polls and surveys, and the new My CYCA.

So, what are you waiting for? Be a part of the adventure with us as we launch the LampLighter online edition! We need your input, and we need your talents! Come join us!

Questions and answers:

Q: Is the printed paper LampLighter going away?

A: Absolutely not! For many of you, this is a perferred format, and not everyone has access a computer or access to the Internet. The paper version is here to stay!

Q: Where can I find the LampLighter online edition?

A: The LampLighter Online is an official website of the CYCA online and can be found online at “http://lamplighter.cooperyoung.org.”

Q: What is My CYCA?

A: My CYCA is available to all registered users of the CYCA website, and can be found top in the top right corner of the pages. My CYCA allows you to use your CYCA login to interact with your community online; with it you can:

* Customize your profile including information about yourself and your interests

* Provide updates to your friends about what you’re up to lately

* Connect and make friends with folks from right here in your area you might not even know lived next door

* See what your neighbors are up to whenever they post their status