Take Care

Where do you get all these zines and will you stock mine?

The majority of zines we stock are here because we really like them, really wanted to stock them and hassled the folks who made them until they caved in and gave us copies to sell.

But yes, we do accept submissions. If you’re interested in stocking your zine with us send a sample to PO Box 4, Enmore NSW 2042, Australia. But please read the following first…

What’s the likelihood of you actually stocking my zine?

Well, we don’t have an open submission policy, which is why we ask you to send us a sample, so it obviously depends on how much we like it! Take Care is many things – folly, labour of love, complete hassle, favourite pastime – but it is not a business, and we have no desire to treat it as such. It is run entirely from our house and we work and study full-time which means we have very limited time and space for it. In other words, we want to be able to feel like the time we do put into it is in aid of stuff we are 100% happy to be supporting, otherwise it would be sort of pointless to be doing it at all. Please don’t take it personally if we decide not to stock your zine. There are a lot of zine distros out there (check out our links page to find a few of them).

That’s cool, I give my zine away for free, so I’ll just send you a bundle to slip in with orders…

No! Please don’t! We apply the same submission/approval process to free zines. Again, it comes down to the limits of our time and space, and the desire to have a level of consistency in the type of stuff we stock.

So… what do you want to stock?

Predominantly, nay, overwhelmingly, we are interested in perzines (personal zines). We are interested in radical politics and zines that explore perspectives on feminism, being queer, mental health, racial politics, anti-capitalism, trans* identities, work, non-work, alternative histories or just stories about everyday life. We’ll also consider music zines (probably more interested in personal experiences of and with music than strictly music ‘fanzines’, though we will consider them too), lit zines, diy/self-published comics, recipe zines and the occasional one-off artist book type thing. The best way to get an idea of what we’re interested in is to look through our catalogue or actually order some zines from us.

I’m a graphic designer and me and my friends are starting a new magazine. It will be sort of like the love child of ‘Frankie’ and ‘Vice’. We’ve self-published the first issue and it’s totally professional and ace. It’s like a new step in the evolution of zines. It’s the future. Would you like to stock it?

Oh dear, context clash! We discovered and fell in love with zines in the relatively (and deliberately) underground worlds of independent record shops, diy gigs, activist politics and riot grrl idealism in the mid 90s, and while it might seem anachronistic or even impossible today to carry on in that spirit, that’s our main desire in running Take Care. We won’t stock anything that is an offshoot of an online magazine, has sponsorship or hi-end advertising, has ambitions to be anything other than a zine, has an issn/isbn, has a huge print run (or is professionally printed) or is otherwise super slick, magazine-like or too expensive for us to carry. In other words, we like zines because of the ways they are not like magazines. Some things that will unequivocally ensure that we won’t stock your zine is if it contains anything sexist, racist, homophobic, classist, misogynist, pro-life, transphobic, fatphobic or otherwise overtly stupid. You get the drill. We really don’t want to come across all puritanical and dogmatic, but that request re: a Frankie and Vice style magazine was one that Emma actually received, and it makes us think that we need to be absolutely clear about what we’re trying to accomplish here.

How do you pay for the zines you stock?

We split sales 80/20. That is, if the retail price of your zine is one dollar, we take 20 cents of that and you get the rest. If you are not in Australia we generally pay upfront. Paypal is easiest for us , but we also offer distro credit or trade. For Australian residents we work on a 6 month consignment basis, but that’s negotiable.

Why can’t I find a consignment form on your website?

Read all of the above, then ask yourself that question again.

I still don’t understand why you don’t have an open submission policy. That’s so elitist. If you’re going to run a distro, you should support all zines and everyone who makes them.

While on the surface this statement would appear to carry some weight, historically, and in reality, it doesn’t hold up. Smitten Kitten, Pander, Paper Trail, Moon Rocket, Vampire Sushi, Riot Grrr, Things You Say, Microcosm, Parcel Press, Marching Stars, the list goes on: heaps of zine distros, indeed the vast majority of zine distros, past and present, have had similar submission policies to Take Care. In fact, we borrowed our’s from them! Distros that do have open submission policies tend also to have physical shop fronts from which to operate. The delightful Miss Candace has written an excellent piece on zine distro etiquette here (scroll down) if you’re interested in reading more.

I sent you a zine for distro consideration/an email asking about something ages ago and you have not replied. Are you lazy, or what?

Short answer, no. But we are busy. Sorry. We will reply, but get in touch again if you’re concerned that we’ve forgotten about you.

Your FAQ page did not answer my Q, dammit.

Sorry, ask via takecarezines@gmail.com