Good evening everybody, and Happy Pride.

This year has been a momentous one, to say lightly. In addition to being our fifteenth anniversary, it’s also the eighth year since our relaunch as a fully reader-supported publication. At the time, we had set out to turn Anime Herald into our ideal form, as an ad-free outlet that pays fair rates to our editorial team and writers.

And, over the past few years, we’ve worked hard to embrace and embody that ideal, keeping our expenses down, and growing slowly and deliberately while dedicating the majority of our funds to the folks who help make Anime Herald the online magazine that you all enjoy today.

And honestly, we’re not in a bad place. At the start of the year, we were able to raise our rates to $ 55 per article, and we have a team of columnists who have been publishing genuinely amazing short-form pieces. And while we’re not quite breaking even each quarter, we are within spitting distance of doing so.

Our Annual Fund Drive

This month, we’ll be pushing to do the following:

•  Break even on our financial costs
•  Raise our rates to $ 75 per article, for both our team and the writers we work with
•  Add a new monthly feature or article series to Anime Herald

In that order. And to reach those goals, we’ll need to reach the following milestones:

• Break-Even: $ 500
• Pay Raise: $ 850
• New Article Series: $ 1,000

In more practical terms, our most popular subscription, according to our backer wall, is the $ 5 Discord Tier. To reach our $ 500 break-even, we need just fourteen people to subscribe at that level. To hit the pay raise, we’ll need 80 subscribers at the Discord tier.

For a new article series, we’d need 114 new backers.

Pride Month Donation Drive

In addition to our subscription drive, this month’s efforts will be part of a greater donation drive. Specifically, I’ll be donating to The Trevor Project in Anime Herald’s name, equal to the total we raise through Patreon and Ko-fi this month, up to $ 750.

As a publication that is owned and operated by a trans woman, which has numerous LGBTQIA+ team members, and works with many LGBTQIA+ writers, this means a lot to me. Now, more than ever, Pride is a time where all of us in the community need to offer each other support. And really, I’m not a fan of rainbow capitalism, or rainbow-washing in general, especially having seen firsthand how quickly many self-proclaimed corporate allies backtrack when confronted by pressure. I’d rather do something that can do some real good in the world.

The Trevor Project has been a vital resource for queer youths, especially as the greater national environment has grown more oppressive. Their work saves countless lives, and we’re proud to support them each year.

In Conclusion

Thank you so much for reading this to the end. If you’re not a subscriber, I urge you to support us and independent anime journalism as a whole. The work all of us do daily can only happen with the support of folks like you.

If you are a backer, I want to thank you from the bottom of my heart, and I hope that we can continue to bring you the very best throughout the rest of the year.

Anime Herald’s 2025 Funding Drive Kicks Off – Samantha Ferreira

Anime Herald