Very thankful for our readers

Thanks to you, our audience, Cutting Tool Engineering is now the No. 1 most requested magazine in the metalworking industry.

As our June 2022 BPA Worldwide circulation audit report shows, 64,302 of you have requested a subscription to CTE in the preceding six months. That’s about 20% more than our competitors reported.

According to June’s BPA circulation audit report for Manufacturing Engineering, the magazine produced by SME, 52,078 of its readers have requested a subscription. Total circulation reported for ME was over 90,000, which includes more than 38,000 unrequested subscriptions. More on that in a moment.

Meanwhile, Modern Machine Shop, which no longer utilizes BPA Worldwide to perform circulation audits, reported that slightly less than 52,000 of its readers requested a subscription. MMS reported this information in its November issue as part of the magazine’s statement of ownership, which is required by the U.S. Postal Service for periodicals delivered through the mail. Total circulation for MMS was reported at a little more than 84,000, which includes more than 32,000 unrequested subscriptions.

Now, about those unrequested subscriptions. While it is perfectly acceptable for a publisher to send its magazine through the mail to someone who did not directly request a subscription, CTE has not taken that path for a couple of reasons. First, we know that the true strength of a periodical’s audience is measured by the number of direct-request subscribers. Second, mailing a magazine to someone who didn’t request a subscription is, in our opinion, the equivalent of sending spam via email. I say this with a bit of a wink because mail is legal and email spam is not. But the value of most unrequested mail — electronic or print — is so low that we call it junk mail.

Still, as long as a publisher reports how much of its magazine circulation is based on requested subscriptions versus unrequested, there’s nothing illegal about it. There is, after all, always a chance that a publisher could convert some unrequested subscriptions into actual subscribers.

While publishers that utilize the services of BPA Worldwide do so voluntarily, publishing a periodical’s statement of ownership once a year is required by the Postal Service. It’s one way to keep the playing field level for all publishers. Without such reporting, there would be no way to verify a magazine’s circulation.

BPA Worldwide, in fact, is an independent body originally created by advertisers, ad agencies and the media industry to audit audience circulation claims made by publishers. Advertisers don’t base ad purchasing decisions solely on reaching the largest possible audience — they want to know they are reaching the largest, most engaged audience possible.

I mention this to you — our readers — because you are now part of the largest, most engaged audience in the metalworking industry. Thank you for sticking with us.