Selected
Article:
Delta
Business Journal Turns five years old
Publication
has been a pro-business voice for the Mississippi Delta
BY
William Werlein
Special to the DBJ
Five
years ago Shelby native, Scott Coopwood, embarked on a business
venture that for all practical purposes, no one thought
would work. A business journal, of all things, in the Delta?
But there were a few key supporters who encouraged him;
to take a closer look at the business climate in the Delta
and he saw some changes beginning to take place. A huge
challenge was before him, however he saw many possibilities
as well. And so with great enthusiasm, the Delta Business
Journal was kicked off.
Having owned the Jackson Business Journal for several years
in the early nineties in Jackson, Coopwood learned the publishing
business from the ground up. “I really fell into the
publishing business by accident–when I met my friend
and mentor Larry Painter on a round of interviews with some
Jackson ad agencies around 1989,” says Coopwood. “I
didn’t get a job in the advertising agency industry,
but I gained a friend and my first business partner.”
Painter, a veteran ad agency copy-writer and well-known
in the Mississippi ad business world, was launching a magazine
called Forward Mississippi, but his partner in the venture
had to back out due to problems he was experiencing with
another business, the Jackson Journal of Business, which
eventually went into bankruptcy. In early 1989, Painter
approached Coopwood about jumping in as partner in Forward
Mississippi, a publication that spotlighted business and
industry in the state, and they quickly began working on
the next issue.
“That publication was a hit,” says Coopwood.
“Larry provided us with all of the strategy and I
was responsible for the advertising sales. It worked beautifully
and really added a lot to the state. We published that magazine
together for several years.”
In addition to Forward Mississippi, Coopwood, Painter, and
another partner eventually bought the Jackson Journal of
Business out of bankruptcy later that year renaming the
publication, Jackson Business Journal. Within about six
months Coopwood bought out his partners, becoming the sole
owner. “I was a little overwhelmed,” he laughs,
“The first year was horrible. It took an additional
$97,000 worth of bank loans to get the paper going and it
was very tough, especially since it was my first real experience
in the business world.”
At the end of the third year, the paper turned a small profit
and the Jackson Business Journal became very popular in
central Mississippi during the early nineties, despite heavy
competition from a great number of other media concerns
in the Jackson area, says Coopwood.
In 1992, Coopwood hired popular Jackson area radio talk
show host, Jack Criss, to come aboard serving as the paper’s
editor. “By that point, we had all new employees,”
says Coopwood. “The only original employee of the
Jackson Journal of Business was our typesetter, Sandra K.
Goff, who is with us to this day.”
Also in ‘92, Coopwood and his wife, Cindy, decided
to move back to his home town of Shelby. “I was ready
to move back to the Delta,” says Coopwood. “I
loved Jackson, but I really wanted to come home.”
With Criss running the day to day aspects of the business,
Coopwood commuted to Jackson two days a week to help run
the Jackson Business Journal for four years. However, in
1996, another business idea came to Coopwood.
“When we returned to the Delta in ‘92, I hadn’t
lived here since 1980,” says Coopwood. “When
I returned, I saw a different Delta. I saw new businesses
and a lot of young people like me who had grown up here,
moved away for a number of years and had returned. There
was just something that I couldn’t really put my hands
on. It was probably a sense that there was more taking place
in the Delta, business wise, than I had known growing up.
It could have also been that since I was publishing a business
journal in Jackson, my antenna was up in the general business
arena and perhaps, for the first time in my life, I realized
that there was more to the business community of the Delta
than just agriculture. Also, several years before my good
friend in Jackson, Mike McCall, who was one of the founders
of the Mississippi Business Journal and also the former
business editor of The Clarion-Ledger, mentioned to me once
that he thought a business journal would work in the Delta
based on the same format of the one I was publishing in
Jackson. Because of Mike’s career in business publishing,
his comment made a lot of sense to me.”
As the Fall drew near in 1996, Coopwood made the decision
to sell the Jackson Business Journal to its editor, Jack
Criss, and began looking into the possibility of starting
a business journal in the Delta. It was a great gamble to
sell a growing business journal in the state’s largest
city and turn around and start a business publication in
the poorest part of Mississippi.
In early ‘97, Coopwood began putting together a strategy
as to how to launch a business journal in the Delta. A variety
of demographic information was obtained and after all of
the data was compiled the overwhelming answer was that a
business journal in the Mississippi Delta would not work.
“I was sick when we compiled all of this information,”
says Coopwood. “I had just sold my paper in Jackson
and I had nowhere to turn.”
Discouraged, Coopwood didn’t look at this opportunity
again for six months. In fact, not long after deciding not
to publish a business journal he briefly looked into the
possibility of publishing an outdoor publication for the
Delta.
“During the search into the outdoor publication, I
realized that if I was going to go to all of that trouble
then I should just go ahead and try to publish a business
journal which would have a far better chance of surviving
because it wouldn’t be so limited to advertising prospects
like a hunting publication would be,” says Coopwood.
In November of 1997, Coopwood met with several Delta area
business leaders seeking advice and getting their general
thoughts on publishing a business journal for the Delta.
One of those Coopwood met with was the late Roger Malkin,
CEO of Delta & Pine Land Company in Scott.
“Roger was one of my biggest cheerleaders in regard
to this idea,” says Coopwood. “I told him about
all of the data that I had compiled and that it said ‘don’t
do this’. Roger encouraged me to ignore the data and
to go ahead with the publication, that it was a great idea
and that the Delta needed it.
“Roger was a unique individual and one of the finest
people that I have ever known. Almost until his death, he
would call me at 10 or 11 at night either congratulating
me on one of our issues or telling me how he thought I should
have done something differently in one of the issues.”
On June 1, 1998, from a converted lawnmower shed in the
backyard of the Coopwood home in Shelby, the first issue
of the Delta Business Journal was published and mailed to
just over 15,000 in the Delta. The response was overwhelming
and to top it off the debut issue made an $1,800 profit.
“We had two employees at that time: my wife, Cindy,
and me,” says Coopwood. “Cindy would answer
the phone, write stories and proof the paper. I would do
everything else, except the layout and design. We were extremely
happy with the response from the first issue because we
had worked so hard on it for months.”
As time passed, the paper grew stronger. By the end of the
first year, the DBJ, as it was beginning to be called, was
being recognized by the state’s media as “a
true voice for business and industry in the Mississippi
Delta”. In the fall of 1999, Coopwood moved the DBJ
offices to Cleveland in order to have more visibility and
to put in place a sales team.
“Whether he remembers it or not, Alex Malouf in Greenwood
told me at that point that if I continued to be the DBJ’s
only salesman and if I didn’t hire a sales team, that
all I’d ever do was keep my nose above the water line.
I looked at what Alex had accomplished in business and thought
that he probably knew what he was talking about. We moved
everything to Cleveland and hired that sales team he recommended.”
One member Coopwood targeted to bring on the new “team”
was his former editor in Jackson, Jack Criss, who by this
time had turned the bi-monthly Jackson Business Journal
into the monthly Metro Business Review.
“After he sold me the paper, I always kept in touch
with Scott and admired what he was doing with the Delta
Business Journal. In fact–and I hate to admit this,”
Criss chuckles, “I remember telling Scott in 1997
that he was crazy to try a business paper in the Mississippi
Delta. You can safely say that I changed my mind quickly!”
he laughs.
Coopwood approached Criss in early 2000 with an offer to
come aboard as Executive Editor with the DBJ. “Coincidentally,
I had recently been contacted by some Jackson businessmen
who were interested in buying the Metro Business Review.
So, my Delta move was really in the cards, you could say.
I felt that I had done all I could do in the Jackson market
and was looking forward to a change.”
In April, 2000 Criss officially joined the DBJ.
“Jack definitely brings his own style and substance
to what we’re doing here,” Coopwood says. “Having
owned his own businesses gives him added insight into the
big picture. Plus,” Coopwood adds,”His writing
abilities and sales experience are huge assets to the paper.”
Coopwood felt that since the DBJ was the only business journal
in the Delta region that there should be an event to salute
all of the great businessmen that the DBJ was writing about.
That fall of 1999, the Profiles In Leadership Awards was
created.
“We found sponsors to help us with the costs of the
event and the first year we invited 400 people to The Cleveland
County Club and saluted Roger Malkin, Charlie Capps, Henry
Paris, and Kent Wyatt,” says Coopwood. “Senator
Cochran was our keynote speaker. We received statewide media
coverage.”
Also in the Fall of 1999, the DBJ teamed up with WABG-TV6
to broadcast a live gubernatorial debate throughout most
of Mississippi between candidates, Ronnie Musgrove and Mike
Parker. Coopwood was the moderator.
“That broadcast really sealed the deal on the DBJ
being recognized as a credible source in Mississippi for
business news,” says Coopwood. “Before then,
people around the state knew who we were, but after that
debate, they were really aware of us all of the way from
Tupelo to Gulfport. Coopwood says that he will always remember
the night of the Musgrove/Parker exchange for many reasons
besides bringing statewide attention to the DBJ.
“One of my greatest memories of that evening is of
Governor Musgrove,” says Coopwood. “As I recall,
both candidates had about two or three minutes in which
to answer a question from our panel. During one of Musgrove’s
best responses to a question, I looked over at the woman
who was keeping time off of the stage there at the Bologna
Performing Arts Center at Delta State and she kept motioning
to me to cut Musgrove off. I wasn’t keeping up with
the time, but to me it felt like he was just getting started
and that he was a long way off from his three minutes. She
was really getting mad, so I just yelled out ‘time’
and Musgrove stopped talking and looked at me as if I was
crazy. We went on to the next question and sure enough,
during that next commercial break when we were off of the
air, the time keeper came up to me on stage and said that
she had made a big mistake, that Musgrove had two minutes
remaining when I cut him off. The governor and I laugh about
that today, but that night it wasn’t very funny to
the him or me.”
The debate also caught the attention of The Wall Street
Journal, who were interested in how a business journal could
survive in the poorest part of America. Coopwood and his
wife flew to their New York offices to be interviewed by
the paper, however the story was never published.
“Although the story was never published, just being
called upon by the most important business publication in
the country was extremely rewarding and added a lot of fuel
to our fire.”
Coopwood says that there are many other stories both good
and bad that he could tell during the DBJ’s five years
in existence.
“The mission we have at the DBJ is to raise the flag
in a positive way on what is taking place in the Delta’s
business community. We also hope that in some way the DBJ
is used as a tool for economic development,” he says.
“Sure, we have a lot of problems here in the Delta
just like other parts of Mississippi. There is much work
to be done to improve our race relations, poverty, and education
environment. But, the Delta is a great place to live and
our future is promising regardless of what you hear. I look
at companies like Viking Range and Delta & Pine Land
who have stayed here and that are on top of their game,
worldwide, with their headquarters located right here in
the Delta. These are just two examples of what can be accomplished
here. There are many more.”
As we end, Coopwood is quick to point out that although
he seems to be the one who always gets the credit for the
DBJ’s success, many others also deserve credit.
“We have a great team here,” says Coopwood.
“We have great writers, a great sales team, and many,
many, loyal supporters who recognize how important it is
for our region of Mississippi to have our own voice. This
is definitely a team effort and the spotlight and accomplishments
must be shared by others.” DBJ
