Backwoods Home Magazine will cease publication with Nov/Dec 2017 issue

By Dave Duffy


­­­Backwoods Home Magazine will cease publishing its print magazine with the November/December 2017 issue. It will be the conclusion of our 28th year in business. We will continue as a “digital only” magazine on Amazon’s Kindle platform (http://amzn.to/2kDXnD5).

We have sent emails to our subscribers and writers, if we have your email. Otherwise, we will do our best to contact everybody. This decision has just been made.

Declining paid print subscriptions have not kept pace with printing and postage costs of a six-times-a-year magazine, so economics has essentially dictated we must close.

Our sister magazine, Self-Reliance (www.self-reliance.com), which publishes only four times a year, is better situated economically and will continue to publish a print issue. After the November/December issue of BHM is mailed out, subscribers will have the remaining issues of their subscriptions to BHM fulfilled with print issues of Self-Reliance.

Self-Reliance is run by younger, but related, people. Daughter Annie, 34, who longtime BHM subscribers have seen grow up in the pages of BHM, is the managing editor, and son Sam, 22, is the publisher. Self-Reliance caters to a similar audience as BHM, but with more emphasis on the idea that “anyone, whether you live in the city or country, can achieve self-reliance.” It is about to publish its 19th issue.

Lest longtime BHM readers feel like they are being abandoned by some of their favorite writers, Self-Reliance has shared key writers like Jackie Clay-Atkinson and Jeff Yago for several years now. Those writers will continue at Self-Reliance, and I even have a limited role there with a new column the magazine instituted last issue called “Making a Living.”

If you would like to subscribe to Backwoods Home Magazine’s five remaining print issues, click here. If you are already subscribed, you will be sent them in the mail as usual. I can pretty much guarantee that these last few issues of BHM will become collector’s items. We’ll work especially hard to maintain the quality right to the end.

I’d like to thank all our readers through the years for supporting BHM. It’s been a fun ride for us and I hope you enjoyed it too. I’m glad now we’ve signed up to be at so many preparedness and self-reliance expos and fairs around the country in the coming months. It will give us a chance to say goodbye in person to all you wonderful readers. Here is a list of the shows:

Feb 18-19 (Sat/Sun): TMEN Fair, Belton, Texas
April 21-22 (Fri/Sat): Preppercon, South Towne Expo Ctr, Sandy, Utah
May 6-7 (Sat/Sun): TMEN Fair, Asheville, North Carolina
May 21 (Sun): Sustainable Preparedness Expo, Grants Pass, Oregon
May 26-27 (Fri/Sat): Self Reliance Expo, Irving, Texas
June 10-11 (Sat/Sun): TMEN Fair, Burlington, Vermont
June 16-18 (Fri-Sun): MREA Fair, Custer, Wisconsin
Aug 5-6 (Sat/Sun): TMEN Fair, Albany, Oregon
Sept 5-7 (Tues-Thur): The National Heirloom Expo, Santa Rosa, California
Sept 9-10 (Sat/Sun): MREA Fair, St Paul, Minnesota
Sept 15-17 (Fri-Sun): TMEN Fair, Seven Springs, Pennsylvania
Sept 22-23 (Fri/Sat): Self Reliance Expo, Denver, Colorado
Oct 1 (Sun): Sustainable Preparedness Expo, Spokane, Washington
Oct 14 (Sat): The Homesteaders of America Conference, Warrenton, Virginia
Oct 21-22 (Sat/Sun): TMEN Fair, Topeka, Kansas