CHARLESTON — This week’s edition of The New Catholic Miscellany will mark another milestone in the history of this storied publication.
It’s the end of an era; the April 25 edition of The Miscellany will feature a new size, design and name.
The nameplate of the April 25 issue will read The Catholic Miscellany. More than 10 years after the re-introduction of The Miscellany name, the word “new” is being dropped from the masthead.
The size of next week’s publication will also be slightly smaller than what readers have come to expect. Due to changes in the printing industry, The Evening Post Publishing Company and its offset printing plant in Georgetown are phasing out the current page size of The Miscellany and moving toward a slightly shorter style, resulting in the loss of about an inch of print area.
However, in conjunction with smaller page size, the font style will be changed and the size increased for readability.
But with these noticeable differences, regularity is maintained in that the page sections and content of The Miscellany will remain basically unchanged.
A national design consultant from Rock Hill worked with the newspaper’s staff to implement the changes.
A readership survey undertaken by the newspaper last fall in conjunction with Marketing Analysis Associates from San Diego, Calif., noted that The Miscellany has a loyal readership. Eight of out 10 people read four out of four issues, and almost 98 percent of clergy read at least three out of four issues. Nearly three-fourths of households spend up to an hour reading an average issue.
The survey also showed that two-thirds of Catholic lay readership makes The Miscellany their main source of Catholic news.
“The Miscellany is one of the Diocese of Charleston’s primary tools of evangelization,” said Jordan McMorrough, editor. “This redesign involves subtle changes to make the paper even more informative and effective.”