Our Mission

SIPA is the international trade association dedicated to advancing the interests of publishers and media companies serving the needs of niche communities. Founded in 1977 with 18 members, SIPA now represents thousands of professionals and nearly 150 members (of all sizes) located around the world, that publish more than 3,000 online and print publications.

Our members own and operate organizations the produce information for various business, consumer, and educational audiences.

SIPA is the premier source of best practices and peer collaboration for the specialized information profession and provides resources and networking opportunities to the member community that help publishers grow and profit, increase efficiency, and improve operations.

Our mission is to serve SIPA’s worldwide membership through education, training, networking and advocacy to foster growth, profitability and professional excellence. The association serves this mission by facilitating research, fostering education, sharing useful tools and developing a great network of contacts. SIPA’s community of professionals prides itself on its willingness to share ideas to help everyone boost profits, better manage their businesses and foster career growth.

What We Do

SIPA represents the interests of specialty information publishers in Washington, DC, and provides information to members on developments which affect the operations of specialty publishing businesses. These efforts take at least three forms:

1. SIPA acts directly in the interests of specialty information publishers;
2. SIPA and its counsel assist member publishers and their counsel in instances which are of potential concern to broad numbers of publishers; and
3. SIPA and its counsel cooperate with other groups representing the press and media in cases of concern to journalists.

Issues of interest to SIPA members include:

• Copyright
• Libel and Defamation
• Sales Tax
• Freedom of Information
• USPS matters
• Privacy
• Electronic Marketing

History

Informal, luncheon-roundtable types of newsletter groups existed in New York City as far back as the '50s and the early '60s in Washington, DC. The Washington group formalized itself into the Independent Newsletter Association with the stated aim of winning full accreditation for its members and their reporters to places such as the Congressional Press Galleries and the National Press Club. Ash Gerecht of CD Publications was the leader in this effort, which was largely successful by the mid-sixties.

Howard Penn Hudson purchased The Newsletter on Newsletters from Morris Hoverstein in 1968. Most of Howard's career had been spent in public-relations work and, he says, it had always been his practice to work as closely with the industry association as he could. Looking about the newsletter business, he found none which seemed to him to present an obvious opportunity to begin newsletter seminars and publish a directory. By 1973 his seminar had evolved into the first of what he called the International Newsletter Conference. By the second or third of these, a group of those attending approached him to say, "Howard, it's wonderful what you're doing here, but we think we probably ought to have a non-profit trade association like just about every other conceivable business." "Fine," he said, "let's organize one." Given the pace of volunteer effort, it took a couple of years until some bylaws were drawn up and the articles of incorporation for the Newsletter Association of America(*) were signed in Washington on January 26, 1977.

In 1983, the board planned to change the name to International Newsletter Association to reflect the character of the membership. Debate, as it sometimes will, went awry at the board meeting, and the board wound up voting to simply drop "of America" from the name, leaving the Newsletter Association which never really suited anyone and so the name was changed to Newsletter Publishers Association in 1983 and then to Newsletter & Electronic Publishers Association in 1999.

During the next two years NAA metamorphosed quickly through stages of association development, from being run on an all-volunteer basis, to an association management firm and then, with the employment of a full-time executive director, to opening our first office in the National Press Building early in 1979.