A Brief History of Our Time

Patrick Mitchell, art director: We spent a lot of time sitting at my computer with Alan asking, "What does this magazine look like?" We struggled with putting random people on the covers, but all those covers just lay there. Finally, we figured out that what was brilliant about those people wasn't who they were or what they looked like but what they were saying and thinking. And for Fast Company to truly represent their spirit, it was those ideas that had to be on the cover. So words became the MO.

Webber: We got caught up in creating our own language. We thought everything needed to be renamed. Because language matters. If you use the same words to describe the world, you're sending the message that nothing's changed. Change the language, and you change the way people think.

Breen: They would come up with a headline and then write a story around it. That was really scary.

Linda Sepp, advertising sales manager: We were out there every day, trying to get to as many people as possible. Usually, they would initially roll their eyes and say, "Just what we need, another business book." Then you'd tell the story: Think about how much the world has changed, both in the tools we use and the kind of thinking going on there. And there was a role for a magazine about the best thinking and competitive tools that would be a strategic weapon. And they'd start to nod.

The debut issue of Fast Company finally appeared in October 1995.

Novicki: When the first issue came out, there was a newsstand at Boylston and Dartmouth Streets, and a bunch of us went down to see. We were stopping people as they browsed, trying to get them to buy the magazine. We were so fired up, we wanted people to share the excitement, and we wanted desperately to be a success.

Valeria Maltoni, reader, Philadelphia: My management director put a copy of the first issue on my desk and said, "This is something you may want to check out." The first thing I saw was "Work is personal." I couldn't believe someone would actually publish something like that. I was hooked right away. The tone and the language, the type of information dealt with a lot of things in my head, but I didn't have the vocabulary to talk about it.

"It was a trip. It felt like everyone was interested in what we had to say."

Brent Hodgins, reader, Toronto: It was kind of, yes, wow, I just read something that I had not been able to articulate myself--that sense of drive and ambition, this notion that the world was our oyster. If you want it, go after it and get it. It didn't matter how old you were or what your job was. This was about what was possible.

Imperato: When I called for interviews, I had this whole spiel: "I'm Gina from Fast Company, we were founded by two HBR editors"--and that would buy me one minute. "And we're funded by U.S. News"--and that would get me another minute. "And can I send you a copy?" I'd call the next day to follow up, and the call would go right through. Once people saw the magazine, they really got it.

Searson: I'd have people stop me on the train and ask, "Where'd you get that magazine?" I'd say I worked there, and they'd say, "Oh my God!"--this weird rock-star situation. It was a most peculiar time.

Imperato: We got story after story from people about how Fast Company changed their lives. It was like that everywhere you went. People had some story about how we had changed the way they ran their team or how they thought about their job, or got them to strike out on their own.

Mike Abrashoff, commander USS Benfold, profiled in the April 1999 issue: After that appeared, I was inundated with emails from people around the world, people I'm still in touch with. They wrote to tell me "Good job," to ask questions, to ask advice: "I can't get through to my boss, what should I do?" They came from Australia, Norway, Mexico, Brazil. I still get emails today.

Seth Godin, entrepreneur and Fast Company contributor: When my book Permission Marketing came out, Fortune wrote a complimentary review, and the reporter listed my personal, spam-free email address. I got three emails. Compare that with my "Purple Cow" article in Fast Company: I got 5,000 letters in 12 days. The magazine just did a really good job at communicating passion. When I got called by Business Week or Fortune, they kept asking, "How much money? What's the ROE?" Fast Company asked the questions, "What are you working on? And is it worth doing?"