Chamber of Commerce Will Spread the Word Monthly in Business Journal

The Orange County Business Journal is about to gain 500 subscribers in one swoop.

Beginning March 8, the business publication will add a two-page monthly supplement written and paid for by the Orange County Chamber of Commerce and Industry. Called The Business Agenda, the supplement is intended to serve as the chamber’s newsletter.

The chamber will also pay to have the Business Journal delivered each week to about 500 of its members who do not already subscribe.

The deal will boost the Business Journal’s circulation, Publisher Richard Reisman said, to more than 14,000 paid subscribers. That’s up from 3,000 two years ago.

Reisman would not say how much the chamber is paying. He said it is receiving a reduced rate because it is a not-for-profit organization.

The chamber is hoping to reach a wider audience than its 1,300 members in an effort to galvanize the business community.

“There’s a real role for our advocacy on issues that impact the business climate,” said Tom Wilck, chairman of the Chamber of Commerce. “We think there’s a lot that’s psychological about the business climate, and we want to be positive and aggressive.”

He said The Business Agenda will take up such issues as workers’ compensation insurance, government regulation and the increasing difficulty of getting business loans.

The chamber is discontinuing its “Business Line,” a monthly newspaper that ran as many as 20 pages.

A chamber member who helped secure the deal with the Business Journal said he is not concerned about potential conflict if the Business Journal, as an independent publication, writes a negative story about a chamber member.

“I would anticipate there will be times when there are differences of view,” said George Kessinger, who is president of Goodwill Industries of Orange County.

Edgar Trotter, a communications professor at Cal State Fullerton, echoed that.

“It seems that the chamber is coming in to reach an audience, not to affect the coverage of the Journal,” he said. “It’s an arms-length relationship.”