Thank you for your interest in FAMILIES Magazines.

We publish two regional parenting publications with wide distribution throughout the Washington, D.C., metropolitan area and the North Florida area around Jacksonville. Our readers are families with children, infants through age 18, and we strive to uncover issues that are important to their daily lives.

Most of our writers are local professionals who share their expertise with our readers. We accept with enthusiasm work from freelance writers. Since we plan the editorial content for each magazine at least 3 to 4 months in advance, we request that all submissions arrive on disk or via e-mail at least 3 months prior to publication.

Our preferred feature-length story is 800-900 words, but if you have longer articles you feel would make exceptional features for our readers, we will be happy to review them. Please e-mail our editor with a detailed query or brief outline concerning each topic before sending any articles. Electronic and disk submissions should be compatible with Macintosh applications in Microsoft Word.

Guidelines for Articles:

• 800-900 Words
• Microsoft Format with NO special formatting (i.e.: bold and italic fonts or underlining, additional spacing and words in all caps).
• E-mail articles and queries to editor@thefamilymagazine.com

FAMILIES Magazines have an extremely loyal group of readers and advertisers. For this reason, we request exclusive rights in our readership area. We do not accept manuscripts that have been simultaneously submitted to other publications in our local regions. Our average payment for one-time reprint rights is $35 for average-length feature stories published in FAMILIES Magazine. Writers will receive an additional $10 if the same article runs in the North Florida FAMILIES Magazine. Payment and tear sheets will be sent following publication.

We encourage e-mail correspondence with our editorial department. This ensures that articles and queries are received, reviewed, and responded to in a timely manner. E-mail correspondence also allows us to establish a friendly communications relationship with each contributing writer. Our editorial department receives hundreds of submissions annually, so please be patient while awaiting our response. Please direct all editorial email to: editor@thefamilymagazine.com.

To request a sample copy of FAMILIES Magazine, mail a check for $4.00 to: FAMILIES Magazines, 485 Spring Park Place, Suite 550, Herndon, VA 20170.