Vegan

The “We’re Back” Announcements

~ deborahemin ~ Leave a comment

We were on the road for 10 weeks. It was one of the most magical tours we have ever taken. It was magical not because we did things different but because we were different.

We’ve become a new kind of traveler. We understand the need for connection, for stillness and for sharing. Here are some of the new ways we will be doing business as a publisher due to these new insights.

Connection is everything

Meeting people and learning about how they live rather than racing around trying to see everything all at once has become important to us. For this reason, there will be more blogging about what I do as a writer but also much more about what other writers do to make their writing the center of their lives.

Being still

Every place we visited was more beautiful than the last place we saw. But for me, northern Wyoming was particularly beautiful due to its quiet, the lack of people and the geography which was stunning. The open, big sky, the low density population led to a quiet that few of us get to experience if we live in major metropolitan areas.

Walking in the woods, the hikes we took, also contributed to that stillness which can only be there for all of us if we have woods and clean air and water to experience. We will be extending the commitment to the environment by sharing more information about what is happening to our planet and by writing and speaking more about what I call “Green Publishing.”

Sharing is caring

This publishing company cannot afford to publish all the books it finds of interest and there are so many. Yet, we can help those who come to the website discover the books we have found to be important now whether published this year or 50 or 100 years ago. As long as a book can be bought as an e-book, we will be glad to write about it and help you to order it.

The commitment is to the tag lines we now use every day: #GoVegan #ReadBooks because that is how I have come to understand the world as I do.

http://sullivanstpress.com  facebook.com/sullivanstpress  twitter@sullivanstpress

 

Sullivan St Press on the Road and at Work

~ deborahemin ~ Leave a comment

Our Itinerant Book Show will be going live soon, which means we’re leaving town. For several weeks (from 7/11-9/25), we’ll be away. We’ll be in our Prius filled with all our gear and hitting many KOAs across the country (as far west as the western entrance to Yellowstone National Park). We will visit as many indie bookstores and public libraries as possible during this summer road trip. We want to learn what goes on there and share with them our books and plans for the future. 

Here’s A Sneak Peek

SSP, as I fondly call my company, has lots of big plans going forward.  

Currently, SSP publishes novels, the Scags Series, and vegan books, the Vegan City Guides. In the works now are two different but ambitious projects based on these two series. What will be worked through over the next months, both while we are on the road and when we return, is a renewed commitment to make SSP an e-book only company. 

What Does E-Book Only Mean?

We’ll stop all Print on Demand. Based on the talks I gave at the NYC Green Festival in June, I worked very hard to lay out the reasons for “Why Publishing’s Future is Green Publishing.” I’ll be sharing those ideas in a series of blog posts soon. The short message is that The publishing industry needs to cut down its carbon footprint and learn to love the e-book. 

Going Forward

The Scags Series will be completed in 2018. Scags at 45 is the final volume. But Scags herself is a new writer for SSP and her first book, also coming out in 2018, Born Loser, Born Lucky will be about the exploits of her character, Sophie, and her work to kill the cancer in our global heart’s soul. We’ll be launching Scags’ books as e-books only. And we’re working on a way to put the entire Scags Series into an app. So, lots to do but all of it will offer much more interconnection with other writers and their books. 

The Vegan City Guides series is also plodding forward. We are talking to and looking for more partners. We want to go 50-state wide. We want to show the entire nation’s vegan footprint well beyond a focus on food but to encompass every aspect of what it means to be vegan. Thus for the animals, for our environment, for our health and for the spiritual well being of those who seek to live compassionately. 

Our goals are ambitious but should even a part of this new work bear fruit, there will be much more of interest to offer readers and writers for years to come. 

#GoVegan #ReadBooks

Why Vegan Now?

~ deborahemin ~ Leave a comment

I could have titled this, “Why not Vegan Yesteday?” but vegans get criticized for their tone, their lack of sensitivity and their self-righteousness.

I haven’t been a vegan for that long (5 years) and I often kick myself about that relatively short time of aligning my conscience with the fate of this planet. Having been an environmentalist for much longer, it amazes me now how long it took me to connect the dots from caring about this planet and caring about the animals.

Everyone’s story is different. Mine began with working on a vegan book (I am a publisher) and realizing how my author’s journey to becoming vegan opened my eyes.

When I talk about being vegan and about being a publisher, you can hear me here on Saturday and Sunday (6/10, 6/11), I am serious. The Sullivan Street Press website is a carbon-free site. We sell our books as both e-books and bound books that are Print on Demand. This means we are creating as small a carbon footprint as possible to be in this world of books.

But I digress.

My question at the top requires an answer. The planet needs your help. The planet is more than this geological rock we are all attached to. It consists of all that is in and on it. All that grows from it. All that has been here. It is a history machine full of billions of stories composed by all the life forms that have called this planet home. Most of that life no longer exists.

Our actions, human actions, have destroyed these species through both abuse and neglect. Our trajectory is heading towards the ultimate destruction of all life we need to survive.

One of the worst contributors to the death throes of our planet is industrialized agriculture. In particular, humans have taken to the brutal raising, genetic altering and slaughter of beef, pork, lamb, goat and turkeys, chicken, duck, goose as well as all life in the seas (fresh and saltwater). We are trying to to feed too many humans. Our planet will soon be exhausted. We have given it an unbearable burden and then destroyed those elements all life needs–clean air and water.

Give up consuming all animal products.  Find better ways to create books than destroying forests.

You can do this. You can save the planet.

Q and A with Vance Lehmkuhl

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“The American Vegan Society appreciates Vance Lehmkuhl’s distinctive voice in Philadelphia and the valuable work that he does keeping vegan views in front of readers throughout the region.”
There you have it, the seal of approval from the American Vegan Society for Vance Lehmkuhl’s work. This past year, Sullivan Street Press had the privilege of publishing two of his books: V for Veg: The Best of Philly’s Vegan Food Column and Eating Vegan in Philly.
I asked Vance to take some time from his busy schedule to answer some questions and here are his answers.
1. If you had 30 seconds to convince me to read your book, not buy it, but read it, what would you say?
If you care about animals, or about vegan eating, or have questions about them or about Philly’s food scene, or if you just like to read fun food writing, this book will satisfy and you will not finish it wishing you could have that couple hours of your life back. I absolutely guarantee it, but not in any legally binding way. It has a lot of good information and a certain amount of attitude, always pushing forward in an animal-free direction.
2. Tell us about how you became a vegan food columnist. (How long, what prepared you for it and why?)
I started out as a vegetarian cartoonist as of about 1992, working my pro-animal opinions into my political cartoon for Philadelphia City Paper, “How-To Harry,” which I drew weekly for 12 years, and also in the “Edgy Veggies” cartoon I did for VegNews Magazine for its first 8 years. In 2000 as I turned vegan I started working as the online editor of the Philadelphia Daily News, and I pitched a vegan story, then another, etc. and for a time I wrote vegan op-eds for the Opinion section. In 2010 I started campaigning for a column and finally got the green light in 2011, and “V for Veg” started that summer with a trip to a hot dog joint that’s no longer there, and a deli that was serving vegan banh mi sandwiches, and which still is. I started the philly.com companion blog V for Veg in 2013.
3. Your writing is both witty and informed–do you think that reflects the vegan community in Philadelphia? Is it sophisticated and fun loving?
Well… I’d shy away from a blanket statement about the vegan community in Philadelphia. Partially because there are a good many vegans here of whom I only know maybe 30-40. Of course there are certainly a good many who are sophisticated and fun loving, but from the big-picture perspective the community, historically somewhat disjoint, is just now growing into a mutually supportive community commensurate with the world-class vegan dining town Philadelphia is becoming, and I think our vegan dining boom that has coincided with, ahem, the run of my column, may be part of that equation.
4. Do you see yourself as a vegan activist or are you reflecting the level of engagement in Philadelphia?
“Activist” is a loaded term both for my fellow journalists and for street activists who don’t want the term tarnished by slacktivism, so I’ll just say I consider myself an advocacy journalist. I’m writing with a clear and transparent mission to advocate for something, but at the same time I have to be held to journalistic standards of factual accuracy. So certainly at the same time I am reflecting the level of animal-free engagement in Philly, which is growing.
5. You have seen a long line of vegan fads, restaurants, activities come and go in Philadelphia. Your book mentions many of them. What are your favorites and why did you choose them?
Kale chips was a fun one because it was like my fourth column and I felt like I recognized this just as it was hitting and before it was considered a trend, so I made a big deal out it with the Drudge-style “Must Credit V for Veg!” On the other end of the timeline, Aquafaba, bean water that can be used in baking, was an exciting thing to find out about and research and try out, and I think there’s still a lot to come from that. I still get a kick out of the Silk almond-milk “Milkman” ad and it was fun to talk to the guy that came up with that. Also, the movie, “Noah” was pretty good and my blog post calling it “vegan propaganda” spent some time as the highest-traffic item of any kind on our site, Philly.com. Lots of fun things I wouldn’t necessarily have encountered if I weren’t watching for column topics, and I am glad to have had a chance to do some of the things, and eat some of the food, that my columnist position has called for.
To find out more about Vance’s two books, you can follow the Facebook pages
@vvegphillysveganfood
@eatingveganin
And order the books through the website: http://sullivanstpress.com/

Q & A with Andy Tabar

~ deborahemin ~ Leave a comment

I met Andy Tabar of Compassion Co at the Vegan Pop-Up Show in Morristown, NJ this January. He was one of the vendors there, along with Sullivan St. Press selling his line of t-shirts, tank tops, sweaters, gloves and so forth. What got me interested in Andy’s business was the fact that he traveled to VegFests all over the country by van and lived in his van. He offered these answers in response to my questions.
1. Describe your business and how you got the idea to travel and live in your van from VegFest to VegFest.

Compassion Co is a vegan clothing line that is committed to creating organic or recycled, USA made and sweat shop free garments. All of our designs feature original hand drawn graphics and are printed using water based inks by a small eco-friendly printshop. My goal is to create clothing that will start productive conversations while still maintaining the vegan ethic throughout the entire chain of production. I started the company over five years ago and it has evolved greatly since then. At the time I still had a home base in New Haven, CT and worked a full time job. I was traveling to local VegFests in the Northeast as much as I could before taking a touring position with the 10 Billion Live tour, a traveling vegan education program. As a tour member, I had a schedule that was 6 months on, 6 months off. During my off period, I decided to pack up my car and visit as many VegFests as possible and see if I could sustain myself off of it. I really enjoyed the lifestyle and seeing I was on the road more than I was home, I decided it was time to ditch my apartment, as well as most of my belongings, and move into a new van. It just made the most sense for the life I wanted to have. One with plenty of freedom and lots of travel all supported by a company promoting a message I believe in strongly.

2. How many people are involved in your business?

As far as the day to day operations go, I am the only person in the company and am technically a sole proprietor. But I do rely on a number of good friends who help with everything from tabling at the VegFests I can’t attend, doing my screen printing and providing some of the art. With all of those folks tallied up, there are 8 of us who make things happen.

3. How many miles per year do you travel?

Currently I travel about 35,000 miles per year.

4. How long have you been in business and how much longer do you think you’ll be living like this?

I’ve been in business since October, 2011. The van life definitely suits me but as the company grows it’s becoming less manageable from a van. I tell myself that I’ll keep doing it until it no longer makes me happy.

5. Can you explain what you sell, how well your sales are going? Do you see any trends in terms of locations/demographics/time of year/year-to-year?

We sell graphic screen printed garments, this includes t-shirts, tank tops, scarves, hats and hoodies as well as buttons and stickers. Sales continue to grow every year. I don’t know how well I’m doing compared to others in my field, but I know I’m able to provide enough for myself and that’s all I really need. As far as trends, I see things like tank tops selling much better in warmer climates and obviously hoodies and scarves sell much better in colder parts of the country.

6. How would you characterize your typical shopper? What kinds of questions do they ask? What’s the most popular item(s) you carry?

People of all demographics seem to love what I produce, it’s hard to tell who my clothing will resonate with. Though I pride myself on sourcing clothing from more ethical sources, the average shopper really only cares about whether they like the design and if it will fit them well. Our most popular design is almost always our “humane meat does not exist, go vegan” design featuring a snarky, rainbow haired, unicorn.
7. What advice would you give to anyone wanting to get started in this business?

The first piece of advice I give anyone that wants to get into the t-shirt business is “don’t” (haha). It’s a LOT of work and it’s a very crowded field. People think the business consists of coming up with a few clever plant-related puns, then stick them on a shirt and they will sell thousands of shirts. It is much more complicated a business than that. It comes down to determination: If someone is truly determined to start their own clothing line, then make sure you have something interesting and unique to offer, then go for it. If someone IS doing what you want to do but you know you can do it better, go for it. Otherwise, it may be time to think of something else to do.