But my more personal voice, reserved mainly for this editor’s column, is quite a bit more pensive, cautious and intimate. So of course, in the bigger picture of 20/20 Magazine, I can become quite boisterous about the shocking cool of having a year with the same name as the magazine I currently herd. And I encourage my team, our publisher, our marketing mavens and our advertising sales reps to do the same.
But the heart, head and soul fueled reality is that optical, much like my other professional arena of publishing, is in a very tense time of critical planning. These next few years are going to be marked by a double layer of evolution and revolution.
Your space voyage through this opti-sphere is starred by numerous challenges including consolidation, private equity, brand awareness, product sourcing, product quality, product pricing, as-yet unnamed entities, and that evasive and elusive spectra of… a digital presence and its inherent partnership of online retailing. (Oddly in every wave, those are page markers in my communications whirl as well.)
So, what are we supposed to do about all this? Look for new gigs? Grump and growl about that “big box” right up next to our precious and personal space? Complain about our customers?
Nope. Actually, none of these reactions are going to do much. The answers are mostly internal. It all depends on what you are ready, willing and able to do. And another key to this opti-kingdom is having the overt ability to find others in this same position and build some sort of strength in common ground rules. Find those dedicated to your commitment and sharpen your shared awareness of what you should do to get you through 2020 and well into this upcoming new decade. Stop trying to figure out the growing power of any challenges facing your commendably chosen profession. In all honesty, many of those seeming roadblocks have their own woes and worries, and the reality is that YOU as a fresh thinking independent ECP are on their radar as one of the most likely (and far more likeable!) challenges.
I look forward to seeing as many of you as possible in 2020 and beyond. I also look forward to seeing as many of you as possible in… 20/20 and… beyond. Let’s SEE each other in a dedication to better vision together.
• James J. Spina
Editor-in-Chief
[email protected]
