The Magalog Guy's MagaBlog

In the past, I’ve defined Magalog and Bookalog. Today, we take a look at the Slim Jim.

If you search on slim jim, you’re hit with food and locksmith-related entries. For our purposes, though, a slim jim is part of the magalog family.

Where a magalog is traditionally about 8.5 x 11 inches, a slim jim is around 5.5 x 10. So the primary difference is that a slim jim is narrower than a magalog and can be shorter.

I have to fudge and say “around 5.5 x 10″ because printing and mailing costs can affect the size. Sometimes a change in the size can have a significant impact on those costs. That’s why I always recommend talking to a print broker if you don’t have a printer you trust to look out for you.

Because a slim jim is smaller than a magalog in physical size, it’s often larger in terms of page count. The smallest slim jim I’ve ever worked on was 24 pages.

That doesn’t mean a slim jim can’t have fewer pages. But if a company is wanting to test a magalog against a slim jim, obviously the smaller size of the slim jim will require more pages to hold the same amount of copy.

So why use a slim jim?

First, it gives you a different look. Don’t forget that part of the goal of any marketing piece is to stand out and be read. The slim jim format is different in size from magazines and traditional first-class mail. So it stands out.

Second, there can be a benefit in terms of printing and mailing compared to a typical magalog. There can be other variables involved in those costs. But it’s worth keeping that in mind when considering a magalog vs. a slim jim.

Oprah Winfrey used a slim jim for one of her promotions. I displayed a few pages from that slim jim in my Boosting Response and Revenue with Magalogs webinar that you can view on for free. (By the way, I present that webinar to different groups. If you’re interested, be sure to contact me.)

While the Oprah slim jim wasn’t my design, if you’re interested in seeing a full slim jim, not just a few pages, you can see one I did for a client on my Issuu site.

While it would be the designer’s challenge and not yours, you should be aware of how a slim jim affects order forms and longer sidebars. On the sample from Issuu, take a look at the order form on page 23. It’s packed! The challenge for your copywriter will be to keep the content to a minimum.

Also, check out page 16, one of many examples where we can’t take the term “sidebar” literally. While that slim jim does have some examples of content that is “on the side,” the significant sidebars like you see on page 16 are dropped strategically in the middle of the copy. Otherwise, as true sidebars, they’d cross pages which is something we didn’t want.

Again, that’s the challenge for your designer and copywriter, not you. But as always, I like you to know what’s happening behind the scenes whenever possible.

For now, hopefully you have enough information to consider whether a slim jim should be part of your marketing mix in the future.

If you ever need help with your marketing material, I do offer a free consultation by phone to talk things over. You can learn more about that and why we should be working together here.