New Editorial Calendars, Featuring African American Publications

In this update to Tin Shingle’s exclusive Editorial Calendar Collection, we have added new publications (new to our collection, but established in the publishing world!) catering to the African American audience.

Keep in mind, these are only Editorial Calendars. There are more media ideas for you to pitch to in Tin Shingle’s Media Contact Library. We have devoted a research project to #blackmedia to make sure we have the publications (digital and print) that people have been loving and have made big impacts on their lives. In our Media Contact Library, you can search by “Black Media” or “African American” for instance, and get search results of people who work for publications who identify with that niche.

About Our Editorial Calendar Collection

For all of our Editorial Calendars, we either get them from the magazine for the upcoming year, or if it hasn’t been released yet (but they still know the themes), we do our scientific study of researching the past 2 years of what that magazine published. If we see consistency in the broad theme, then we make a prediction. For example, if Essence Magazine did “Women In Business” in October for the past 2 years, then we predict that to be the broad theme again for 2020.

However, the utmost important tool you have access to is the publication and submission date through 2020. You are able to determine where a magazine is in their production cycle so you can pitch them a timely story angle. There are SO MANY ideas you can pitch. Knowing the broad theme is helpful, but not the most important aspect to your pitching. Think big! Think broadly!

African-American Career World Magazine

African-American Career World Magazine is the career link between African American students, graduate students, and professionals and the employers seeking to hire them.  Featuring career strategies, industry trends and role model profiles that aim to inspire the African American community.

EDITORIAL CALENDAR PLANNING FOR NOW: Black History Month, Healthcare, Government, Military

Black Enterprise

Since 1970, Black Enterprise has been the premiere source of business information and advice to African American professionals and entrepreneurs. They seek to empower their audience to take control of their wealth and success.

EDITORIAL CALENDAR PLANNING FOR NOW: You’ll have the publication dates, which is key because this magazine works on articles months in advance. Knowing these dates is how you will pitch really timely story ideas that can work for most any broad theme.

The African American Golfer’s Digest

The African American Golfer’s Digest, launched in 2003, is the nation’s leading publication for avid Black American golfers. It is unique in that it is a 100% minority and woman owned and operated business, and the only golf magazine specifically for the African American demographic. Available by subscription only and independently published, it is an integral guide that features activities enjoyed by golfers including tournaments, book reviews, celebrity news, fundraisers, traveling, competition and healthy living.

EDITORIAL CALENDAR PLANNING FOR NOW:  Finance

These Are Only A Small Sampling Of Editorial Calendar Themes!

Many more editorial calendar ideas are in Tin Shingle’s Editorial Calendar Collection. These are a small sampling, highlighted for you to see what you need to dive into.

Members of Tin Shingle at the All Access Level of Membership have instant access to ALL of our editorial calendars. We currently have the editorial calendars from over 100 publications for 2019! All searchable by Title and Area of Interest! Browse through and let your inspiration take hold!

All editorial themes are from editors themselves and are subject to change.

Send in media contact or editorial calendar requests to member@tinshingle.com

Updating Media Contacts Library: CRWN Magazine

We first learned about CRWN Magazine through a feature that appeared in Alley’s newsletter, that featured one of its members of the co-work workspace. That member is Lindsey Day, co-founder of CRWN Magazine.

The magazine launched as a zine, and grew to a publication with 20 contributors and advertiser support, according to this 2016 article in Yahoo Beauty. At the time of that article, the magazine’s Instagram had 15K followers. Today it has 44.6K and growing.

Co-founder of CRWN, Nkrumah Farrar, pointed out in that article that there were not many publications catering to women who have chosen to live a natural-hair lifestyle. Farrar pointed out, that publications available like Sophisticates, Hype Hair and Black Hair tend to not be owned by or operated by black women, and lack a focus on beautiful imagery.

CRWN Magazine covers more than just hair, said Lindsey in that article. “We probably have more thought pieces and essays in the issue than we do things that are specifically pertaining to hair. We use natural hair as a pivot point to connect with an audience of African- American women who share similar psychographics that led them to eventually becoming natural.”

Read this amazing interview with Lindsey in Byrdie to learn how and why she and Nkrumah created the brand, how important it is to them to have African- American women in printed pages, how they thought of the name, and much more.

We’'ll sum up with the mission statement as stated on CRWN’s website:

CRWN Magazine exists to create a progressive dialogue around natural hair and the women who wear it. We're reaching beyond trendy clickbait and #BlackGirlMagic to address the whole Black woman; a woman who is more educated, well-traveled and sophisticated than ever before — largely because generations before her have fought to ensure her seat at the table.

Through beautiful content, thoughtful commentary, hair inspiration and resources; we’re telling the world the truth about Black women by showcasing a new standard of beauty — and documenting our story in tangible, print form.