Site Update: Patreon boosts, transcript goals, and future plans

First, because we only said it on Twitter and we really should be celebrating this more loudly: We made our podcast transcript goal! [Insert happy flailing Muppet gif here] All backlog transcripts are fully funded and ready to roll. Thanks so much to everyone who helped us reach our goal! We’ll be publishing the transcripts at our usual steady pace for a few more months, so keep an eye on our Twitter for updates.

Second, and the bulk of this update: Some of you may have noticed that our monthly Patreon totals saw a, uh, rather sharp uptick the past few months. We try to be as transparent with our supporters as possible, so we thought we should address that and our financial plans for the immediate future.

The explanation for where the extra funds are coming from is simple: we have a Very Generous Patreon Donor (let’s call them “Pat” for short) who has been donating an eye-popping $5000 a month. We’re deeply grateful to them for their support—and if you’re reading this, Pat, from the bottom of our hearts: thank you!

That said, we’re also a bit hesitant to start changing our current policies or upping our article output, because we’re not sure if this is a short-term or long-term boost (we contacted Pat to get a feel for their plans, but have not received a response at this time). We’ve also seen a drop in overall donors the past couple months, which means we could be in a bit of trouble if the situation were to change.

So, for the moment, it’s still business-as-usual here at AniFem as far as our publication schedule goes. Instead, we’ll be using this surprise windfall to handle business expenses, take care of our employees, and tackle some one-time projects we’ve been meaning to get to:

• Hire a graphic designer to create logos and avatars for the site and podcast. Dee’s freebie freeware designs were never meant to be permanent, and it’s high time we swap them out for a professional product.
• One-time payments to our financial manager, Chiaki, and our financial advisor, QB, for their help in transitioning AniFem from a personal business in the UK to an LLC in the US. They’ve been working for peanuts out of the kindness of their hearts with the understanding that we’d compensate them as soon as we were able, and we’re delighted to be able to do that now.
• A modest increase on premiere review payments for the Summer and Fall seasons. Our writers work their butts off on those reviews and we want to reward them at least a little for it. We’d love to maintain that pay increase (and expand it to editor and contributor fees as well), but it will depend on our future finances.
• Finally establishing that online store we’ve been talking about for years. This still requires a fair bit of research and planning, but we know we need additional revenue sources if we ever want to expand the site to include more articles, manga reviews, and so on. A shop where folks can find cool anime-themed merch while supporting marginalized artists seems like a great place to start.
• Adding to our “Running a Business Costs Money” savings fund so we don’t have to stress about things like taxes and site hosting fees, at least for a little while.
• (Stretch goal) Manga recommendations pages similar to the ones we have for anime.

We’ll keep an eye on our finances and reevaluate in another half-year or so. And, as always, we’ll keep you posted on progress and projects along the way.

Thanks to all our donors for their continued support! Anime Feminist could never happen without all of your help, and we’re so grateful to you for it.

Stay cool out there, AniFam, enjoy those new summer shows, and we’ll be in touch again soon.