Be a NEMOA Person

Writing this issue of The Corner View from Cambridge, Mass., during the Spring NEMOA conference this week, I found myself reflecting on the types of people who attend this conference, as well as the types of people in this industry today. Although the catalog business has undergone much consolidation over the years, which has stripped some companies of their entrepreneurial spirit, when you come to a NEMOA, it reinforces the industry’s ages-old character.

NEMOA people are warm, caring, entrepreneurial and very social. They share a unique passion for the catalog business. In many respects, they’re indicative of the traditional cataloger. But guess what? They’re hardly dinosaurs. Those I’ve seen here run the gamut in age. Some I’ve known for years, others were attending their first NEMOA. But age doesn’t matter at NEMOA: Everybody here’s eager to learn, share ideas and meet up with their peers.

Litle’s Retrospective

During his lunch presentation on March 22, industry trailblazer Tim Litle gave a retrospective of the 60 years of NEMOA and how the catalog business’s growth and change has comparison. Tim made me feel both old and young. Having covered this business for a little more than 20 years now, I particularly appreciated Tim’s reflections of the ’70s when I was still in high school. When he reached the mid-80s, however, I found myself feeling the top of my head for all the hair I’ve lost since then.

But when Tim talked about the entrepreneurial spirit and the cooperative bond that’s always been found at NEMOA conferences, it didn’t seem to make a difference which era he was talking about. And I felt it first-hand at other sessions and cocktail parties here this week. Most everybody wants to help each other; at the same time, most everybody is looking for help.

I attended my first NEMOA about 15 years ago. NEMOA types then vs. now aren’t much different. They’re the types that’ll help the catalog/multichannel business grow and survive rising postage and other obstacles. And if the business ever needed this, it’s right now with a huge postal rate increase on the horizon.

Keep a ’70s Practice Alive

At one point when he made me feel nice and young again, Tim reflected on how he and his wife Joan bought the Clymers of Buck’s County catalog in the late ’70s and the many people they networked with back then who helped give them a kick in the pants. He explained how Bill Knowles of The Stitchery and Potpourri catalogs got printer Foote & Davies to take the Litles’ business even though their catalog was a direct competitor.

As Tim pointed out, it wasn’t always this way, in both the industry as a whole and at NEMOA conferences. In the ’80s, for instance, catalog founders became less involved with NEMOA; conference volunteers became less motivated; generational transitions weren’t always smooth. But it picked up again in the ’90s and ’00s. And that cooperative atmosphere was certainly evident here this week.

Outdated Name

Even though the business has changed and many of its constituents have moved on, that same spirit is alive. Tim noted how four of the five words from the original name of the group (New England Mail Order Association) are outdated. With most catalogers now getting well over 50 percent of their orders on the Web, this is no longer the mail order business. Of course, toll-free numbers all but killed the mail order business years ago. What’s more, the conference has been drawing catalogers from across the country for several years now, so it’s hardly confined to New England anymore. In fact, the NEMOA board recently scrapped the five words in favor of the acronym.

In true NEMOA spirit, the NEMOA board put together a last-minute session at the end of the day Thursday, the 22d, for a free-flowing idea exchange on ways to survive the postage increase. Led by Garnet Hill president/CEO Russ Gaitskill, the session lasted about 45 minutes and the ideas were flying left and right. Although few were revolutionary, all of them were, nevertheless, worth serious consideration.

Among the ideas were adjusting trim-size, reducing catalog paper weight, add-a-name, co-mailing, reducing the number of contacts and improving address hygiene — but not cutting circulation. We’ll have more on these ideas in next Tuesday’s edition of Catalog Success Idea Factory.

But for now, as we approach postal doomsday, I ask you: Are you a NEMOA person or type? Are you in touch with the catalog/multichannel business? Do you keep in touch with your peers, your competitors (your suppliers, at least)? I recommend you do, as NEMOA people are the types who’ve helped this business thrive and will foster its growth going forward.