Just as you’re planning your spring wardrobe, we’re already planning our issues for sweater weather. And we want our October 2009 issue to feature your amazing pages! Yep, we’re planning a special section in this issue to showcase stellar, knock-your-socks-off pages. Do you have a layout (or six or more) that fits this description? Do you know of another scrapbooker whose scrapbook designs fit this description? If so, we want to see them. From the stunning pages received, the CK editorial team will select an assortment to be featured in this special section.
This section will replace the usual spots we set aside for Hall of Fame and Scrapbooker of the Year contest winners, since these contests are on hiatus this year. But we didn’t want that to stop us from finding and showcasing fresh talent and amazing pages. Don’t let it stop you from submitting either.
Here’s how:
*Submit as many times as you wish from now until May 10, 2009.
*Please send up to two images (not to exceed 500 KB) of never-before-seen amazing scrapbook pages per email message to AmazingPages@CreatingKeepsakes.com.
*Put “Amazing Pages” in the subject line.
We look forward to seeing your amazing pages!
Megan Hoeppner, Creative Editor
Margaret Scarborough, I have admired your work in SS for years now (and your adorable children) … now I am admiring you for your mind, too! What a brilliant post. These people who think there’s something wrong with expecting to get paid for work performed will wake up someday feeling foolish.
I have never submitted to CK. They do not owe me anything. I have subscribed or purchased their magazines since conception. In the past when negative things have been said about this company and their associates concerning their business practices I have discounted them as coming from negative uninformed people who were probably rejected for publication.
It saddens me to say that I may have been wrong and have been hasty in dismissing those who have spoken out in the past. [EDITED FOR VIOLATION OF USER TERMS] You don’t buy things you can’t pay for. [EDITED FOR VIOLATION OF USER TERMS] Go have dinner out, then when the check comes don’t pay it and see what happens.
To dismiss those who have been cheated, YES, cheated as being catty is wrong. [EDITED FOR VIOLATION OF USER TERMS] A large business doesn’t just wake up one morning and decide to restructure.
[EDITED FOR VIOLATION OF USER TERMS] As more and more magazines arrived on the scene the designers started sending their work to them, so payment seemed to be the way to keep them submitting their best work to CK.
They have really paid very little over the years for their content, some people are like Crystal- just happy to be published, they feel it’s an honor to be deemed worthy. They don’t mind other people making money off their creations.
[EDITED FOR VIOLATION OF USER TERMS]
Seems to be it should be CK themselves fighting this battle and not a regular reader as you seem to be.
Sarah, if your comment about just wanting to be pubbed was directed at me and not the “other” Crystal, I’m actually really torn at this point. I do want to support the magazine, but at the same time I am very upset at what is happening–not so much w/ the bankruptcy itself, but the endless lies that designers are coming forward with (like one girl was actually told by CK that she should wait until they contact her w/ a settlement offer, which the deadline is 3/11 for that, and then she found out that they never had any intentions of contacting her at all!)
And, I’m kind of like you…I’ve always been one of the people who took up for CK a little–through the mismanagement, the HOF fiasco, the KOTM disasters and everything. But, I think this is definitely the last straw for me. I can kind of see both sides to this, so I have stayed out of it for the most part, but when you hear about designers being lied to repeatedly…it’s just really crossing the line. I guess I can understand to an extent why they can’t communicate directly, but they have gone past that to explicitly lie to people and it’s something that everyone should consider.
I’m still kind of torn with my support of the magazine, because I always want to try to think the best of people, but my eyes have definitely been opened by all of this.
I’m not going to say much – other than I don’t know a single designer who had a contract and didn’t actually send in their layout and back out of it. The people who were noted as “going to the Pub” and told “aw, it’s ok” are people who submitted and by the time CK got around to asking for their layout, it was either picked up by someone else or posted online and not available. All that happens BEFORE a contract is entered into.
So, to say that designers back out on contracts is really an affront to anyone who has done work – mostly BY ASSIGNMENT – as in hired for service – as in I offer you a payment in return for doing something for me that I tell you to do.
I do not know a single person who has ever accepted an assignment and not followed through. I’m sure that there have been extenuating circumstances like family emergencies and such but then those people didn’t still expect payment.
But this is like commissioning a piece of artwork, the artist creates and delivers (all at his own expense), and then the person who asked for it displays the art, invites their friends to see it, maybe even charges an admission to the gallery where it is displayed and then says, thanks for the art! But I’m not going to pay you the compensation I promised you.
Even if the person is owed just a little, that person still spent their time, working because they were asked to work, used their personal supplies which cost them money, paid for the shipping that they thought they would be reimbursed, etc. It’s not selfish to think that if you tell me you’re going to do something for me to believe you will do it.
I commend all of the designers here who contributed to SS and CK, that made the magazines worth buying in the first place, for your courage to come here and say this.
I have a friend who has not commented here, who has worked hard for CK for a long time, who is trying to figure out how they will pay their mortgage for the next while because they were depending on payments for the huge amount of work she’s done for them.
If it had come out sooner, people could have done their work elsewhere and gotten paid. [EDITED FOR VIOLATION OF USER TERMS]
As a CK reader and scrapbooking consumer, I am very disappointed to hear that CK is attempting to get NEW designers without paying the old designers what they are owed. I do not design or submit anywhere, but I have been a CK subscriber since 1999.
I believe that Margaret, Lisa, Stephanie, and others have very eloquently stated the reasons for their unhappiness without venom or vitriol. This is clearly an ethical issue, and I believe that it takes a tremendous amount of courage to publicly state their concerns.
I think posters like Crystal, Nicole, and Lenny are failing to recognize is the business end of this situation. Lenny chastises people for “not understanding” business law, but s/he clearly does not understand the real issue. The issue is truthfulness. Truthfulness would mean keeping designers that are owed money up-to-date with the situation. [EDITED FOR VIOLATION OF USER TERMS] THAT is the crux of the matter.
I find it quite disturbing that anyone would post that those designers are “bitter”, “selfish”, or any other derogatory term used. CK is a business, not a person. Expecting a business to be run ethically and morally in terms of its customers, employees, and practices is not selfish. It is the antithesis of selfish. This is another example of the adoration of scrapbooking icons running amok. We admire a SB product or personality and suddenly any criticism (even legitimate and well-presented criticisms) are attacked and nefarious motives applied to those that dare speak openly and from the heart
Well said Margaret. We will miss your work.
I find all of this quite sad really. There are magazines by the dozens closing and most are having to file for some type of aid. For those who are fighting to receive payment for services rendered, whether contractually or not, I feel the greatest sympathy. For those who feel like helping-CK-out-by-submitting-and-not-expecting-anything-in-return, be wary. CK is suffering from lack of print ad revenue just like so many other puplications. Say what you like, but newspapers, magazines and other printed resources are going away and internet-based periodicals and advertising are beginning to fill those empty shoes.
Crystal I wonder if you feel the way you do because you assume most of the designers who are published in CK are pubbed because they just happen to do the pages for their own scrapbooks anyway and well….they might as well submit for fun at the same time.
That most certainly is a hobbyist in it for fun and they may decide to cut their losses on the amount paid because they accept they did the page for their own personal scrapbook anyway.
BUT alot of people who are owed money here are people who CK specifically asked “can you do this for our company”. They did not say, do you just happen to have a layout lying around that suits this theme.
They asked them to do something with specific requirements under a specific contract. THEY, (CK) initiated the reason for the debt to be paid yet now they are turning around and not honouring that.
This financial mess doesn’t happen over night. Directives should have been given some time back to restructure the compensation for layouts according to what they can afford. If that means nothing to be paid, then it means nothing, but be upfront about it. It’s called MANAGEMENT!
The whole concept of offering people after December their contracts to be paid in full is insulting. It is queue jumping. Pay the old designer debts first and then worry about incurring new debt. It almost seems obscene that some designers are getting full payment for January layouts and yet 40% for December layouts. Totally absurd.
I have never submitted to a magazine so I have no stake in this fight. I don’t even have a subscription because well, the HOF Kristina-Bernie scandal was enough to shine a light on the ethics of this magazine for me. Then the KOTM crap hit the fan. And now this? You really must be burying your head in the sand to even think of submitting pages after this when the calls keep going out and no mention is made of what or if any compensation will be given.
To all you owed money, I hope you sue the pants off of this company. Class action, anyone?
[EDITED FOR VIOLATION OF USER TERMS]
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I am not one that is owed money but I just want to vomit literally when I see this magazine still asking for submissions when they can’t even pay what they owe already. I have never in my life had such horrible dealings with a company and quite frankly CK your getting exactly what you deserve. You can’t expect to be an on top business with horrible and lousey business practices and ethics. I am sure you will just delete this post but the facts will never be erased. People are finally seeing what you stand for and just because you choose to bury your heads in the sand doesn’t mean your paying customers will do the same. Thankfully, I am no longer oneof those customers. I choose to spend my money where it matters and it isn’t with this company!!!!!
WOW! I didn’t realize how my comment would be taken (obviously)…but one thing to add to those who aren’t receiving your payments…did you ever think that since CK had to file for this restructuring, they can no longer divulge info about debts owed???
I worked for a company that also filed for restructuring and any money we owed to people was turned over to the lawyers and the firm handling the restructuring. If we had anyone call to inquire about a refund or payment, we had to direct them to those people. And I will tell you, most people DID NOT get paid.
And since you signed a contract, I guess if you are owed enough to make it worth your while, you could hire a lawyer…
Sorry I rubbed you guys the wrong way!
Nicole, I’m hoping your comment isn’t as condescending as it comes off.
” It is sad that people scrap for the compensation! ”
These were assignments that I was given as a JOB. With a contract with specified compensation.
It is completely unfair to say that expecting to be paid for an assignment is “sad”.
I’m trying not to get angry, but comments like that are infuriating.
Comment by Stephanie Howell — 03/05/2009
Stephanie,
no, i’m not a mean person here. I didn’t make the comment to sound condescending at all… just making a statement that’s all.