The Times They Are A-Changin’

It’s been about 60 years since fiberglass boats became popular, and about that long ago that Bob Dylan wrote the song “The Times They Are A-Changin’.” Since then, sailing, the sailing industry, and publishing have all undergone major changes. You may have noticed that Latitude 38 is a little thinner than it used to be. There are numerous reasons for that, but either way, it means we have less advertising and less revenue to do all we want to do for the West Coast sailing community.

With that, Latitude 38 is reaching out to readers to ask for your financial support. We are dedicated to connecting the world of West Coast sailors, supporting the fun and adventure, and covering the stories that have always inspired us and so many of our readers. Your contributions will help. And we’ve got an easy way to make that possible:

You’ve probably heard many good reasons to support local journalism and to connect with and support a thriving regional sailing community. Among our great motivators are all the great comments we get from readers when they subscribe, comment or email us. Below are a couple of recent ones.

From the handwritten subscription renewal we received in the mail, pictured below, “Thank you, Latitude 38, for being a part of these many years. May your horizon be clear with a lively breeze abaft the beam — as I find myself far ashore, with no marina handy to pick up a copy of your rag, I enclose $36.00 for another year’s subscription.”

A text received a few days ago, “Number 1, Latitude must survive for sailing.”

From a writer who sent in a story about sailing with Bernard Moitessier aboard Joshua on San Francisco Bay, “Latitude 38 is now and has been for over half a century the coolest sailing mag on the planet, nothing even half as fun.” (Actually, we’ll hit the half-century mark in 2027.)

Here’s a comment we received with our New Year’s post: “We are so lucky to have Latitude 38 in our sailing community!”

We truly love all these comments, but they don’t pay the printer! We feel so lucky to serve such an amazing community of sailors and have such a great Bay and coast to sail. You could help someone else read about it all by sending them a gift subscription.

With the help of West Coast sailors, we can do our best to showcase all the ways people get onto the water under sail. We try to squeeze in the Three Bridge Fiasco, the Baja Ha-Ha, wing foiling, youth programs and tall ships. These get into the pages of Latitude 38, ‘Lectronic Latitude or our Good Jibes podcast. We want the magazine to keep you all connected and sailing together far into the future. You can help us do it. If you go to the contribution page, you’ll find, beyond cash, there are many other ways to support Latitude, and we hope, by extension, to support sailing.

If you want to try a win/win, perhaps you want to contribute enough for an ad for your favorite nonprofit. It would help support us and promote their cause. Contribute here and see how it feels. If you like it, you can do it again sometime.

P.S. You’ll see this request popping up more often — we hope you can help.