Hello, and happy holidays to our readers. As the wild mouse ride that was 2016 winds down, we have an announcement to make: The December 2016-January 2017 issue of My Table magazine is the last one that we will produce in this format. Starting in January 2017, you can expect significant changes in My Table magazine, our online newsletter SideDish and my-table.com. Let’s begin with the website.
Since last summer we have been working with a company in California to build an entirely new website. Our current website, launched in early 2011, was brilliant at the time. It was so good-looking and nimble that it took third place in the AIGA’s Texas Show 2012. But five years is a long time in the digital world, and it’s time for a reboot and refresh.
The new website, which we’ll roll out around the first of the year, will be more user-friendly with easier navigation. The design will be modern, fresh, clean and much more robust. Our readers and advertisers have told us that they want to read more articles on the website, and we listened. Going forward, we will publish original content daily online.
This last point is especially important. Our website is about to become much newsier as we report and break local restaurant news, rather than round it up for the Table Talk column in the bimonthly print edition. In other words, Table Talk will now be on our website, and it will be updated frequently. Likewise, restaurant openings (and closings) will be updated in real time and added to our website. Interviews, trend stories, cooking videos, recipes: There will be something new to read or watch on the website every day.
SideDish, our digital newsletter, will be published once a week on Thursday (rather than Tuesday and Friday). Instead of being an online publication unto itself, SideDish will be a digest of our stories. Think of it as a weekly table of contents delivered to your inbox that will guide you back to all the new stories on the website. Each edition of SideDish will have a full roster of our stories from the preceding week along with a calendar of upcoming culinary events.
Finally, there’s My Table magazine, the print magazine that is the heart of our entire business. As the website takes on more of the news delivery and becomes a resource for both readers and the local food industry, the print magazine can evolve into something a little different. We know that readers love to hold and linger over beautiful print magazines. We know because you often tell us so.
Our goal is to write and photograph longer, more thoughtful and more elegant articles. We will produce a lush magazine devoted entirely to the Houston food and drink world that will come out twice a year – Spring/Summer and Fall/Winter. These issues will each have many more pages than the current My Table. Every issue will be a keepsake publication. Readers treasure our print magazine, and we want to serve you even meatier and more flavorful print issues.
In addition, we will produce two single-topic editions of The Ultimate Food Lover’s Guide to Houston every year. The guide will be packed with information delivered in succinct reviews and lists. Each edition will be devoted to an area of town or a kind of food. We’ll tell you where to eat now and where to find best in class. These single-topic UFLGs will be released and mailed to subscribers between the two My Table magazines.
If you’re a current subscriber to My Table magazine, you don’t need to do anything. We will continue to deliver our publications to you, just as we have for nearly 23 years.
Why are we making these changes? The publishing world is changing, as you know. News is migrating to the internet. On the other hand, well-designed print magazines will always have a niche, and – let’s be honest here – the My Table crew loves print.
You’ve probably noticed a change in our magazine’s look these last three years, and the feedback has been very warm. Now, we are ready for the next phase in our growth and expansion. We look forward to taking the best about My Table magazine, SideDish and my-table.com and moving things around a little to create something that you will find even more useful and pleasurable.
I hope you will join us in a toast to the future. Cheers!