The Tierneys put parenting first,both in their family and in their company.
Randall and Ann-Marie Tierney run Tierney Publishing, which prints Parenting Orange County, a regional magazine available at doctors’ offices, private schools and local grocery stores. It is also delivered to subscribers’ homes for $18 a year.
But the couple’s real priority, according to Randall Tierney, is their 13-year-old son Shane. They even alternate days at the office to make sure someone is always at home for him.
“The biggest challenge for us is to keep the family life with our son and our business separate,” Randall Tierney said.
The company won the small business honor at the annual Family Owned Business Awards luncheon hosted by the Orange County Business Journal and California State University, Fullerton’s Family Business Council on Nov. 19 at the Hyatt Regency Irvine.
Bought in 2004
The Tierneys bought the parenting magazine in early 2004 when Virginia-based Landmark Communications Inc. was looking to shutter it. Randall Tierney was working as its regional publisher at the time.
“I told my wife we should buy this thing because I always felt it could work,” he said.
The couple went into the business as partners: Randall Tierney as its publisher and editor-in-chief and his wife as its associate publisher and chief fin-ancial officer.
“We didn’t know what we were getting into,” he said. “It was a lot harder than we thought it would be.”
Tierney admitted the first couple of years were difficult as they had to get the magazine’s name back into the market and regain trust of advertisers and readers. Working and living together challenged but ultimately strengthened their relationship, Randall Tierney said.
“It would be difficult to go into business together if you don’t have a really strong marriage as a foundation,” he said. “We’re pretty straight with each other and try not to let our family life bleed over into the office and vice versa.”
The couples have made numerous changes from the original Land-mark model, which still publishes Los Angeles-based L.A. Parent.
The biggest change in coverage was to make the magazine’s focus even more local.
“We’re fiercely local in our coverage, using community sources and focusing on what’s going on in Orange County rather than the national scene,” Randall Tierney said.
The November issue had a story on homeless children in OC and how families and schools are dealing with the matter.
The couple funded the magazine entirely with their life savings and the mortgage from their house, Randall Tierney said.
“And for that reason we had to make it work,” he said.
The magazine has had to be more inventive this year after an industrywide drop in advertising.
“We’ve seen the decline in revenue,” he said. “We started more aggressively into events that have more than made up for the shortfall in the ad pages.”
Baby Fair
The magazine is set to launch its “baby fair” this Saturday, sponsored by Saddle-back Memorial Medical Center in Laguna Hills.
“You can’t follow the old model of the print publisher anymore,” Randall Tierney said. “You have to diversify and reach out to your audience in new and different ways.”
He jokes that his son is looking to become the next sales manager for the magazine. But since he’s still in junior high school, that’s a long way off.
“But he works at all of our events,” Randall Tierney said. “He’s a natural sales and promotion guy.”
