Be Magazine Launches | Video

Alyssa Marino | 1/13/2013

You can find just about any magazine at a newsstand, but one publication is written by and for women in Bismarck and Mandan. Every day, ideas come spewing from Michelle Fransworth`s hands as she types from her home office. A few months back, one of those ideas was Be Magazine: a publication entirely by women for women.

"I approached Brian Kroshis, publisher for the Bismarck Tribune, and one morning we had a meeting and I came in there and told him my idea, and ironically, he had been on the same thought process," she said.

Farnsworth doesn`t work alone, she has a full team of women right with her. "I am blessed to know a whole team and been introduced to people at the Tribune that are so incredibly talented."

The Be staff has expertise in various skills needed to make a magazine successful. "Each issue starts with a story line. Then I will go through and gather all the elements for each story, photos, graphics. Then we`ll start laying out the stories," graphic designer Bobbie Lee said.

"We`re all in the brain storming sessions, to figure out stories, and we all work together as coming up with different ideas," creative director Veronica Selway said.

"I have the fun part. We get to take the product out, we get to go see advertising customers and I think it`s a really great thing to be able to take a fresh new product that`s unique and very targeted to women," advertising director Kristin Wilson said.

There are eight contributors on staff, each with a different theme. One contributor, Jody Kerzman, is no stranger to deadlines after her long career in television. "Be Magazine is an opportunity for me to just write like I would write a blog and to hopefully can inspire some other moms," she said.

"This is maybe an area of content we were lacking a little bit and so we thought a women’s magazine would be perfect," Wilson said.

The locally written and published magazine covers all topics that impact the everyday woman. As you may want to "be everything," the team behind it wants to remind you to just "be yourself."

You can find be magazine at local grocery stores and businesses throughout Bismarck and Mandan.

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