How direct mail helped keep a vintage New Orleans jazz record label afloat in the wake of Hurricane Katrina

By: Lekan Oguntoyinbo

Seventy-nine year-old George H. Buck has weathered more than his share of storms, so when Hurricane Katrina roared through the Gulf Coast three years ago, pulverizing more than half the city of New Orleans, Buck says he wasn’t too fazed. His New Orleans-based jazz label, Jazzology, had survived other upheavals in its 58-year history, and Buck figured he’d ride this storm out, same as always.

But this wasn’t just any storm. And when the rains and flooding finally stopped, Buck soon realized the damage was far worse than he’d bargained for. The print shop he used – to print CD covers, catalogs and the label’s iconic custom magazine, Jazzbeat – had been deluged and forced to shut down. The warehouse where he kept thousands of old wax LPs and back issues of Jazzbeat was destroyed, most of its inventory forever lost.

Still, Buck refused to despair, his spirits buoyed by the one constant that kept Jazzology tethered to its glorious recent past: his direct mail customers.

“We didn’t get flooded in our offices, and we still had our customers around the nation and around the world,” says Buck, whose headquarters are based in the French Quarter, which was spared the brunt of the hurricane.

And so, even as the waters receded, the telephone calls, letters and e-mails began to trickle in. Soon, Buck was fielding calls from around the globe from jazz buffs desperately hoping that their favorite label hadn’t gone under. With the calls, Buck says, also came orders for more music. And slowly, steadily, Jazzology began its long trek back to business as usual.

“We’d be out of business without direct mail because we don’t have record shops,” says Buck.

Instead of using countless distributors, Jazzology – the umbrella company for nine smaller boutique labels – takes orders directly and has relied on catalogs and its branded publication to help maintain contact with consumers. Buck concedes that more of the label’s fans are turning to the Internet for their orders, but says that direct mail remains the company’s most important marketing tool.

Its primary communications link is Jazzbeat, a quarterly magazine mailed free to 9,000 members of the Jazzology record club, which also serves as the source for its mailing list. For $5, members can join the club and receive a lifetime membership as well as a complimentary subscription to Jazzbeat, which is available only by mail. In return, the club asks that subscribers buy at least one record per year. The magazine, which is filled with reviews and articles about traditional jazz, is also the primary vehicle for showcasing Jazzology’s newest products, particularly since the storm had made finding a printer for the label’s colorful catalog more difficult.

In fact, Buck says, Jazzbeat is so popular that music orders often spike by nearly 100 percent whenever the magazine is released. “The magazine has done very well for us,” says Buck, who moved Jazzology Records to New Orleans from Atlanta in 1987. “A huge amount of our sales is from direct mail. Most of our sales are made through direct mail or individual mail orders from people. Most of our individual sales come from people on our mailing list.”

Jazzology, with its subordinate boutique labels, is more than just a traditional jazz record label. It is also a shrine for the genre and an archive for its varied manifestations. It boasts a piano jazz label, a big band label, labels devoted to New Orleans-and Chicago-style jazz, and even a label that handles blues records. In addition, Buck has created a foundation that’s devoted to traditional jazz, and he hopes that the foundation will also help stave off larger labels that may try to buy out Jazzology and change its mission after he has passed away.

Buck acknowledges that, despite its global reputation and solid sales numbers, Jazzology remains largely a labor of love, not one of immense profit. No surprise then, that Buck is more comfortable honing the label to meet listeners’ tastes rather than to follow commercial trends.

This has allowed him to fine-tune his longtime relationship with the fiercely loyal aficionados who are Jazzology subscribers, a relationship he has developed through years of steady direct mail outreach. As a result, the label’s fan base stretches from New York to London to Tokyo, he says.