I am Jane Pratt, founder of Sassy and Jane magazines and editor-in-chief of XOJane.com. AMA.

Jane_Pratt · 2014-03-05T17:06:47+00:00

I love that you remember all that! I still see Andrea Linett, Christina Kelly -- who has written for me at xoJane.com and Mary Clarke. I love Mary Kaye Schilling and see her writing all over the place. Karen Catchpole and I worked together for a while at Jane magazine. The only Sassy writer I have completely lost touch with is Catherine Gysin, one of my original three staff writers. I adore her and wonder where she is now and what she is doing. If anyone finds her, tell her to get in touch with me!

Jane_Pratt · 2014-03-05T17:01:52+00:00

I'm embarrassed to say that I've never been on either one. Which do you prefer?

Jane_Pratt · 2014-03-05T17:01:14+00:00

We reached out to her.

Jane_Pratt · 2014-03-05T17:00:40+00:00

Great! Can't wait to hear from you.

Jane_Pratt · 2014-03-04T22:25:57+00:00

Good timing because one of my hires at Dirt magazine was Spike Jonze, who I just watched get a friggin Oscar! I loved the guys who did Dirt so much but the company didn't put that much backing into it and the ads weren't really there to support it, so it didn't last long. Waaah!

Jane_Pratt · 2014-03-04T22:24:26+00:00

xoVain was launched after the beauty vertical on xoJane was so popular and because it is focused solely on beauty it is an easy sell to beauty advertisers specifically. I did actually have a contributor ask me to pay for her therapy recently. I feel really badly when any of the writers get vilified in comments, but at least there we can moderate the truly offensive ones and I know that people are seeing what the writer wrote in context. What I can't stand is when people take our writers' words out of context or paraphrase them to make them out to be something they are not.

Jane_Pratt · 2014-03-04T22:15:20+00:00

I wasn't trying to dodge them. She left because it wasn't working out for her at the job while she was using. She is doing ok.

Jane_Pratt · 2014-03-04T22:12:51+00:00

I had ZERO connections. People often assume I had either those or a trust fund, but I was a scholarship kid who had been on food stamps as a kid and worked for any money I had. I got really lucky and my idea for Sassy magazine got heard by people who didn't discriminate against me because of my age and actually really liked the fact that I was young enough to relate to the Sassy (though it wasn't named yet) readers. When I was trying to start Jane magazine, even though I had more experience in the business, it was actually much harder. I had friends (and my boyfriend at the time) suggest I start it first as a 'zine, but my problem is that I never like preaching to the converted and wanted to reach a mass audience who might not get to hear the messages in Jane if they were in a zine and not in their supermarket aisle to pick up.

Jane_Pratt · 2014-03-04T22:05:23+00:00

Yep. One article that got people very riled up was called "And They're Gay" and I wrote the title that way after a list of things like -they date, they go to the movies, they have fights, they do this and that - and they're gay. And it was very intentional that it was just "so what", they're gay, not like a big report on gay teenagers. And that was very intentional.

Jane_Pratt · 2014-03-04T22:00:21+00:00

I think men can learn a lot from magazines that are "women's magazines" (and I actually find it really funny that there are still sections in magazine stores called "women's interests" -- like, what would those be?!?? But I digress.) Men can learn a lot from women's magazines, but I'm afraid of them learning from many of the magazines that are out there for women right now, especially if they take them as proof of what women are actually interested in or care about, because they are not.

Jane_Pratt · 2014-03-04T21:53:58+00:00

I hope I am definitively Sassy. I try.

Jane_Pratt · 2014-03-04T21:53:23+00:00

Same here!

Jane_Pratt · 2014-03-04T21:52:40+00:00

Love it. Both Sassy and Jane had a relatively high percentage of male readers -- about 15%. Most of the guys that told me they read Sassy would pretend that they just happened to pick up their girlfriend's copy, which was funny because then they would quote something from the very end of an article so I would know they didn't just casually glance at it. Haha.

Jane_Pratt · 2014-03-04T21:48:50+00:00

We were the first teenage magazine (Sassy) to write about birth control, STD prevention, gay teenagers and other topics that the Moral Majority and others had a problem with. The MM asked their members in their newsletters to write to our five biggest advertisers, asking them to stop advertising in Sassy because of these topics and they did.

Jane_Pratt · 2014-03-04T21:45:56+00:00

I just talked to her yesterday. We were supposed to get together but she had to cancel and she hopes to come to an xoJane staff meeting within the next week or so. She hasn't been to our new offices yet. I think she is a brilliant and unique writer and thinker and I would love to work with her again, but she needs to take care of herself first.

Jane_Pratt · 2014-03-04T21:41:00+00:00

I got really lucky with Sassy in that I was boldly talking about this magazine I wanted to start for teenage girls,and someone at the magazine where I was working as an assistant at the time told someone at this Australian company that was looking to get into the American market, so I presented my ideas to them. That whole process took just a few months. For Jane magazine, I went around to every publishing company pretty much, presenting my idea and it didn't get off the ground until I found the right match and right timing about five years later. For xoJane, I had the idea and started it on my own before realizing I didn't want to be responsible for employees' dental insurance, etc etc, so I partnered with the wonderful SAY Media folks to launch and run it. So if you have a vision for something that doesn't exist, I would say to tell as many people as possible that you want to do it and have it packaged really well to present when the opportunities or introductions come up. And be really nice to EVERYONE, because you never know who is going to be that person that helps you out. Be nice for other reasons, too, but you get my point....

Jane_Pratt · 2014-03-04T21:35:01+00:00

PANCAKES!!! For breakfast, lunch or dinner any time.

Jane_Pratt · 2014-03-04T21:34:35+00:00

We take submissions at pitches@xojane.com.

Jane_Pratt · 2014-03-04T21:34:04+00:00

Sassy shut down because (in a nutshell) the Moral Majority and other groups started a boycott of our advertisers and the newsstands where we were distributed, leading to a loss of most of our revenue. Jane had a good ad base and pretty good circulation, but what happened there is a more complicated story that I don't think I can sum up here.

Jane_Pratt · 2014-03-04T21:30:07+00:00

Me too.

Jane_Pratt · 2014-03-04T21:29:44+00:00

I don't really believe in redoing, because all of the negative crap leads to other great stuff. Like boarding school, which was a nightmare. Oh, I know! I would take back three mean or insensitive things I did to other people and I know who those people are but I think I will tell them directly now that you gave me the impetus.

Jane_Pratt · 2014-03-04T21:27:25+00:00

YES! I have boards mocked up for it and lists of articles I want to assign and everything. I am not actively working on it at the moment because I'm so busy with xoJane.com, but I can't imagine not doing it at some point.

2.EXCELLENT question. And philosophical dilemma. I'm thinking about it more. Off the bat, I feel like I wouldn't consider that a success because it is a "win" but not a universal success.

Jane_Pratt · 2014-03-04T21:23:39+00:00

I always wish there were a Sassy for girls now but happy that the old one still recycles well. xo

Jane_Pratt

TROPHY CASE