Yesterday the Ethanol Producer Magazine team finished up the October issue. It's at the printers now and readers should start receiving their copies in a couple of weeks. The theme this month is biomass, so you can expect to read about second generation feedstock development, management, growth and harvest.

 

Of course, readers can also view it at ethanolproducer.com. The content from the magazine, stories written by our staff, columns and other content written by outside sources, will go live on the website starting next week. We trickle that out slowly so readers can expect to see new content from the magazine almost daily for about two weeks.

As long as we're talking about the October issue, I thought I'd share a little bit of behind the scene information about our process. We just recently posted our monthly themes for 2016 online so I thought it would be a good opportunity to explain a few things about how we select the staff-written stories for each issue as well as our deadlines work.

 

This year's themes were fairly straight forward. One theme per month. While not every story is written on theme, the majority are related to that theme. In 2016, we're trying something a little bit different. Each month has two themes, which may or may not be related. For example, the two themes for January 2015 are microbial control and 2016 outlook: CEO perspectives. We'll write at least one story on each of the two themes. One benefit is, if a reader has less interest in one of the themes, it's possible the other one will catch her or his attention.

 

Now let's talk about deadlines. One I always tell people is, the deadlines listed at the links for the monthly themes are sales deadlines, not editorial deadlines. So if you are interested in talking to us about a story idea that fits into a future theme, it's a good idea to do it well in advance.

 

So you see what I mean, let's look ahead to the November issue. Actually, the stories for that issue have already been selected and quite a few interviews have already been completed. We'll have the planning meeting for the December issue in less than two weeks, believe it or not, so let's walk through the process on that issue.

The first step is our monthy planning meetings. Starting in January, we've been inviting outside stakeholders to call in to those. These people help us come up with story ideas and give us feedback on the list of stories we are considering for that month. It has really helped us come up with new and better story ideas and shaped the issues published so far in 2015.

 

Those on the call are primarily EPM editorial board members, made up of ethanol plant upper management, and other stakeholders that have knowledge in areas related to that month's theme. December's theme is environmental, health and safety, so I'll reach out to a number of vendors, service providers and other experts in those areas. If you or your company fits into that category and you have an on-theme story idea for us, send me an email at hjessen@bbiinternational.com and, if we haven't already got a full dance card, I'll invite you to to participate.

 

That's part of why I've shared the links to next year's editorial themes. If you spot a theme that you or you or your company has expertise in, you to can reach out to us in advance of that planning meeting. Just be sure you do it well in advance of the month you've got your eye on. A good general rule of thumb is that you should contact us about four months prior to the month of interest. To see what I mean, let's revisit the December example. Although that sounds a long way off, we'll have the stories for that issue planned out by mid-September, so there's not a lot of time left before we have our plan already in place.

 

Keep in mind that the best way for you to help us is to give us story ideas. Rather than just saying, I'd like to be in the December issue, because my company has expertise in the area of environment, health or safety issues in the ethanol industry, tell us what kind of story we might want to write about on that theme. Keep in mind that whether we do write on the suggested subject will depend on the size of the issue, so how much space we have to fill, and what we talk about during our planning meeting.

 

One story I know we will be writing in the December issue is about ethanol production companies with good safety records and how they accomplish that. So if you know of or work at an ethanol plant in that category, please send me an email!

 

So there you have it, more details about our editorial themes, monthly planning meetings and more. Thanks for listening and, as always, feel free to contact me if you have any questions.