In 2017, after the presidential election, in a fit of civic-mindedness, I subscribed to The Sacramento Bee, Marin Independent Journal, The San Francisco Chronicle, The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Atlantic, The Economist and The Davis Enterprise. My father, who had passed away that year, always taught me: If you don’t like the way things are going, support the local press or write your congressman. I wasn’t quite at the “email the senator” stage, though he was. Fun fact: 2017 is also the year Substack started its business.
A bit of consumer therapy hit the spot. Click, click, and credit card info entered. Democracy bolstered, if only slightly. I was sending small amounts of money to enough places that I thought if enough of us did it, it would matter.
In addition to my high-minded act of civic service, I also gained access to Wendy Weitzel’s column, Comings & Goings. Frankly, it was always the most useful and information-packed column in The Enterprise.
If you had told me that Wendy was paid a couple hundred per column as a contractor, I wouldn’t have believed you. I naively thought my $15 monthly subscription was helping her get paid. I assumed Wendy was full-time and paid respectably because her reporting seemed like a lot of work to me. I certainly didn’t want to do it, not that I even knew how. So it seemed fair.
My understanding of the deal was incorrect. In an interview with Bill Buchanan, veteran journalist, editor and radio host, about these transitions, Bill explained that the subscription used to pay for the ink, the paper and the delivery. That’s it. The advertisers paid for everything else.
So, the columnist or reporter doing the work you really want? Your subscription does not help them. Hold on - I thought I was doing my part with my subscriptions (bolstering democracy even). That journalist you think you’re supporting? You’re not. Who are you supporting then? The institution? Right.
Speaking of institutions, contrast Bob Dunning’s legendary column The Wary I at The Enterprise. Bob knew his column was the leading feature in print. Wendy knew hers was the most popular online. In conversations, I asked, “Do you have stats? Do you know the data?” I got head shakes. There was a “most popular” list Wendy monitored daily, but it would shift throughout the day.
This provided an intuitive sense that she was up there. Bob had decades of readers telling him they were reading him in print. So, they had indirect indicators of their success. But did they actually know? Who knew?
“The editor confirmed my numbers were amazing,” Wendy recalls, though she doesn't remember his exact wording. He acknowledged her impact.
It would be like assessing my teenage son’s hygiene by how many Tide pods are left. If the Tide pods are gone, I guess he did laundry, wore clean clothes and was probably clean at school. There’s a big leap from the data you have to knowing what is actually happening.
Now on Substack, Wendy gets information that looks like this. She can see how many emails were opened and how many subscribers joined from that particular column. She has a dashboard of key facts and figures about her column’s performance.
Hundreds of reader’s comments are now available to her. Here are a few:






It's oddly comforting to see other readers echoing exactly what I was thinking.
Wendy had to fight for her column, taking concessions and pay cuts along the way. She persevered through a layoff, continuing to write even when told there was less money to pay her. For a day’s work, this often translated to maybe $25 per hour, depending on the workload. As an independent contractor, she received no benefits, and her tax burden came out of the couple of hundred bucks. Every extra hour of effort lowered her effective hourly rate.
During COVID, Wendy’s column became a lifeline for many readers - practically a full-time job. Recognizing its importance, she negotiated a raise and returned to writing weekly instead of biweekly. “I told them they were going to pay me,” Wendy recalled, “and the editor didn’t wince.” To manage the increased workload during COVID, Wendy maintained a detailed spreadsheet. Her determination paid off, and she won two California Journalism Awards for business coverage and column writing during this period.
Wendy’s fee-per-column model meant she bore all the risk and costs. If a column took longer than expected, she didn’t earn more; she simply absorbed the additional time and effort. The paper, however, reaped the benefits. No matter how valuable or popular her column was, Wendy’s pay remained the same. The burden for the risks and costs of the work shifted entirely to her, making each column a gamble that primarily benefited the publication.
When she and I discussed what her numbers might look like when she started her Substack, we figured she needed about 230 paid subscribers at $5 a month to match her previous pay. We didn’t know if 230 was a lot. Maybe we would get 50. We decided to see what happens and work with what comes in.
She had 285 paid subscribers on her launch day.
Here she is three weeks later. The support has been so strong from subscribers that Wendy has had the time to write an additional piece about her experience at UC Davis talking to a communication class. She’s planned a party.
She’s written her column three times, just as she did before. It’s inadequate to say it’s not different - it’s better. I see Bob and Wendy inspired and fresh with their work. The readers are complimenting her format. The photos look great. The emails look great.
The co-founder of Substack, Hamish McKenzie, who Bob and I met earlier, is rooting for her.
She’s listed 44th (yes, 44th!) on the business best sellers list at Substack, while Bob is ranked 45th on the culture leaderboard.

That’s ranked worldwide. These publications didn't exist a month ago. How does this town now have two top 50 Substack best sellers?
Seriously, that’s a question I’d like answers to.
"How does this town now have two top 50 Substack best sellers?"
I imagine part of this answer is that the sheer number of loyal readers, developed over many, many years at the Enterprise, followed them to Substack, en masse. Wendy used FB to widely promote her column, which probably resulted in her larger online following in comparison to Bob.
Suppression of real journalists through a system of indentured servitude in Davis the supposed liberal capital of California. The Enterprise, what an apt name for the overseer to manipulate dedicated people into a form of slavery. Glad to have met Bob and Wendy which happened because Bob was disenfranchised and Wendy needed to respond to the situation. Your support Brian transformed these truth tellers into an arena they never imagined could be part of their life. We the fellow downtrodden can really identify with this in the still covid era where the Sacramentans opposed to militarization of the police are made superfluous as all city counsel members vote to approve the expenditure. to buy military hardware so in coming plandemic we can really be oppressed. What happened to we the people? There should be a recall but there won’t be. Bee no longer prints letters to the editor until Sunday and who knows how these are chosen. Again participatory democracy is dead in print via main stream news and killed off by complicit elected officials voting for equipment their constituents oppose. So we look forward to having people like Bob and Wendy tell it like it is and you too Brian - thanks.