Hello Ravenous readers,
We’re in the beginning of week two of our Feed the Bird subscriber drive, and at this moment we’ve gained 72 new paid subscribers, which covers about a quarter of our goal of 300. If we reach 300 paid subscribers, we’ll have a robust budget to open up freelance opportunities to food writers and creatives to publish even more great food journalism. For those who haven’t become a Ravenous paid subscriber, here’s your chance to get 25% off an annual membership. Feed the bird today!
And for those who are already paid subscribers to Ravenous, we’re beyond grateful for your support in our early launch. We are a worker-owned publication that depends on paid subscribers to keep our website running. Because of you, we don’t have to worry about rich VC bros getting mad at us about calling out Noma or a Murdoch shutting down a review about RFK’s puzzling new cooking show. Because of you, we have the time to investigate important stories like this report about a chef detained by ICE when traveling from the FIFA World Cup Final instead of spending an embarrassing amount of time spraying a carbonated drink with water to make it look perfectly “dewy” for a sponsored content campaign (I’ve been there — that’s for a later installment of our Food Media Horror Stories series).
We’re excited to announce that we can provide more benefits to our supporters by accepting tax-deductible donations. Ravenous is now fiscally sponsored by the non-profit Tiny News Collective, which means they can accept tax-deductible gifts on our worker-owned behalf. This includes gifts from foundations, donor-advised funds, and employer match programs as well as personal gifts. So if you mysteriously come across a large sum of money, consider sending it our way. Get the deets on our Monkeypod donation page. If you donate $1,000 or above, matching our Big Spender threshold, we will make sure you are listed as one of our BFFs.
On top of fiscal sponsorship, TNC has been critical in helping us connect with other newsroom founders to exchange resources and ideas. While we have decades of experience working in food media, we’re still learning the ins and outs of bookkeeping, subscriber growth, fundraising, and all things you need to know to run a business. Plus, they’ve been able to cover the cost of Ghost, our CMS platform, and Canva. To be clear, this isn’t a sponsored post — we just truly are grateful to be associated with this organization, and we hope sharing this resource is helpful for other small newsrooms out there. It’s organizations like TNC and supporters like you that help us do what we do. [cue the “Viewers Like You” PBS jingle]
New on Ravenous This Week
Ali Francis
Jaya Saxena
Courtney E. Smith
🐦⬛ Bird Droppings
- Our fellow worker-owned food publication, formerly known as Gourmet magazine, has been renamed Buffet magazine.
- I haven’t seen the Tony movie yet, but this commentary on how the film explores today’s toxic masculinity culture makes me hopeful that the story isn’t all chef worship-y.
- Vittles does a deep dive into the economics of London restaurant influencers. Yet another sign that the food influencer era might be over.
