ABOUT US

New Day Films is a unique member-owned distribution company comprised of more than 100 independent filmmakers. For nearly 35 years, we have worked collectively to distribute our work directly to the audiences who most want and need them. In fact, we have created the most successful and enduring cooperative distribution business in the media industry.

Life is not simple. Our films explore multiple truths and realities by humanizing complex social issues and telling good stories.

The New Day collection reflects the passion, vision and voices of the some of the world's most innovative independent filmmakers. Among us, we have garnered an Academy Award, nine Academy Award nominations, four Emmys and hundreds of top honors at the most prestigious national and international film festivals, as well as broadcasts on P.O.V., Independent Lens, HBO and other national programs.

Our films move people to think deeply about real and often overlooked people, give voice to untold stories of culture and politics, and bring the power of social action to life through artful storytelling.

Many of our films come with curricular tools designed to enliven dialogue and debate. We care about the stories and people in our films and we care about the teachers, students and communities who use our films to grow and stay active, making a difference in the world.

We are here to help you use our films to reach your goals. That's why we make the independent films we do and work to put them directly in your hands.


Because we at New Day Films are both the filmmakers and the distributors of our work, we are particularly interested in meeting your programming needs. Feel free to email us and tell us how we can better serve you either in the content of our work or with new ways of delivering our work to you.

Our passion during production continues in our commitment to self-distribution. Our goal is to satisfy you, the audience and educator.



Join New Day Films
You Want to Self-Distribute Your Film?

New Day Films, the premiere distribution cooperative for social-issue media, invites membership applications from independent film and video makers with titles for non-theatrical distribution. We also actively encourage diversity in our membership and within the content of the media we distribute.


We sell our films to educational organizations nationwide, including high schools, colleges, universities, and libraries, among others. New Day's collection is small and specialized to maximize our effectiveness in the educational film market. New Day members screen and select new titles from among those submitted by makers seeking admission to the co-op.

Why Self-Distribute Within the Context of a Co-op?

In New Day, filmmakers stay closely connected to their films through the promotion and distribution process.


Film and video makers have the potential to gross a higher percentage on their films than is possible with a commercial distributor. Right now, on average, active New Day members keep 67% of their gross incomes after paying their share of New Day costs; most commercial distributors take 80% of gross.


Our central office books and ships our films, bills our customers, issues monthly accounting and royalty statements, and provides mailing lists of market-tested customers. This service frees up filmmakers to do what we do best, make films.


Business expenses for running the co-op are shared by all New Day member-owners through "shares".


In New Day, you are a member of a community of filmmakers who share knowledge of national and international distribution, film and video production, fundraising, and other essential skills. Members share information freely, give each other support, and work together to educate audiences.


You benefit from over 20 years of name recognition that is respected and valued by media users.
OVERVIEW

Frequently, when independent producers finish films (in what follows, please read "film" to mean film or videotape), they place them with one of the distribution companies that service the "educational market." The company then determines how many prints should be made, how to publicize the film, where to send previews, which festivals and conferences to enter, etc. In return, producers are paid royalties based on a percentage of income from rentals and sales, after expenses have been deducted.

For producers, the advantages of this arrangement are that they need not put up money to launch a film nor spend time in the distribution effort.

Disadvantages are: (a) The royalties distributors pay to producers are generally low (usually 20% of a film's gross receipts) and the producer has almost no opportunity to monitor income or expenses. (b) The producer often has little or no control over how, or to whom, the film is marketed. (c) Contact between the producer and audience is virtually eliminated. (d) The producer can seldom influence the distributor to spend extra time or money on the distribution of a film which might take longer to find its audience.

WHY NEW DAY WAS FORMED

The original members of New Day came together in the early 1970's because they had produced feminist films that most distribution companies considered too "controversial" to have a market. The producers felt strongly that part of their objective in making films with a feminist theme was to see that the theme reached the appropriate audience. They therefore decided to take on the task themselves. (More on New Day's beginning)

New Day's initial group of four producers bought some mailing lists, designed brochures and sent them out. The group expanded to include other feminist films and a film on masculinity, and gradually developed more sophisticated distribution and marketing techniques. In 1979, a decision was made to open the group to films about social change in general.

Today there are over 50 New Day producers and over 100 films on a wide range of topics as you can see by browsing through our subject index and our index of film titles.

HOW NEW DAY OPERATES

A. What Self-Distribution Means

Self-distribution is essentially a mail-order business. The producer provides a supply of prints and tapes, produces a brochure about the film, purchases lists of potential users, and mails out the brochures. Other distribution activities New Day members learn may include telemarketing, getting reviews in professional journals, attending conferences, entering festivals, showing the film semi-theatrically, and organizing benefit screenings.

Over the years, strong New Day target audiences have been colleges and universities, secondary schools, community groups, libraries, hospitals, labor unions, political organizations and church and religious organizations. New Day members are constantly seeking new viewers and new ways of reaching them.

B. How New Day is Organized

New Day is a cooperative of individual producers, each of whom represents one or more films in the collection. The producers do the distribution work on their film(s) from their own homes or offices. These can range in size from one-person operations (just the producer) to businesses with large staffs. Annual costs for the activities listed above can start as low as $3,000 or $4,000, and increase considerably (to as much as $10,000 or more), depending on volume and type of promotion.

Members share certain activities, costs and duties that aid the entire group. The films are advertised and known to the public as the New Day collection. Booking, shipping and invoicing are handled by a fulfillment house in New York State.

Active members have equal rights, duties and decision-making roles. New Day has a Steering Committee which conducts the ongoing business of the group. Each member is assigned a Steering Committee member liaison to foster effective communication. In June the members come together in a retreat-like setting to catch up with each other, talk through the issues facing independent producers and distributors, and sharetips on how to promote their work. Minutes of meetings and Steering Committee telephone conference calls are circulated to all members.

C. Shared Expenses and Responsibilities

Members share in the cost of producing a general catalogue, purchasing mailing lists for distribution of the catalogue and other material, advertising for New Day as a whole, costs of attendance at a few key festivals and conferences, travel expense to group meetings, and the costs of running the co-op and its central office. Group costs are paid on a graduated-share basis, calculated on gross income. New members pay an initial $100 membership fee but are excused from shared expenses for the first six months of membership so they can conserve cash to invest in their individual promotion.

In addition to expenses, members share tasks. After their first year, they are expected to perform major tasks for a few years and smaller tasks thereafter. Such work might include researching group mailing lists, serving on the Steering Committee, coordinating catalogue production, etc.

New Day receives all income and issues monthly statements. When income exceeds expenses and shipping costs, a check is sent to the producer. Co-op costs are deducted from each member's gross income before royalty checks, or bills, are issued.

D. Subgroups

In recent years, New Day members whose films have similar target audiences have organized sub-groups (i.e., anthropology, aging, family, art) These groups do joint mailings and share costs of attending conferences in their subject areas.

E. New Members

We have three screening sessions for new member films per year. RECEIPT by Sept. 5, 2008, January 22, 2009, and May 31, 2009. Please be aware that Applicants are restricted to one film per cycle. This has to do with the capacity to review the number of submissions. Exceptions can be made at the discretion of the Acquisitions Chair. Once producers are accepted, have signed New Day's exclusive non-theatrical contract, and have paid the $100 initial fee, they receive a New Members booklet which provides basic self-distribution information culled from the experience of current and past members.

F. Submission Checklist

Your film must address a social issue.


Your film should not be a "how-to" instructional tape or a corporate video.


You must have secured releases and rights to all music, archival footage and stills used in your film for educational distribution. If your rights are still in process, contact NAME (National Association of Media Educators) before applying.


You must have agreements in place with all copyright owners of the film authorizing you to distribute the film to the educational market.


You understand that New Day is a co-op and that you will be required to contribute volunteer hours on behalf of the entire co-op in addition to your own self-distribution efforts.


You understand that New Day makes decisions by consensus and that the organization's culture embraces participatory democracy.


You understand that unless granted special permission, you will not be able to make your film available to a home-video distributor for at least three years after joining New Day (although you can sell copies for individual use at screenings).


You must have your own funds to pay for initial promotional efforts (e.g. designing, printing, and mailing a brochure). There are many ways to do this, but we suggest that $3500 - $5000 is probably the very least you can start with.


Before you submit an application, you must have an in-depth conversation with at least one New Day member about what membership involves (see the contact information below if you don't know anyone else in the co-op already).


With rare exceptions, as a new members of New Day, you must live in the United States or Canada and be planning on marketing your film to the U.S. educational market.


While each member of New Day is allowed to set the price for his or her own film, pricing must be comparable to that of other New Day titles of similar lengths. We have a floor below which prices to the community and university markets can't fall.


Your film must be completed when you submit it to us. We can't accept rough cuts.
Every June, we hold an annual meeting of all active New Day members. This is an unparalleled opportunity to get to know other makers and learn about the co-op and distribution. All active New Day members are strongly encouraged to attend the Annual Members' Meeting every year; and for new members, it is a requirement that they attend their first two years in New Day. New members who join between June and October are also required to attend a mid-year steering committee meeting (usually in November). The costs for attending these meetings are shared equally among all active members of the co-op.

G. Some things New Day is NOT
A funder. New Day Film does not provide funding of any sort. We are a group of independent filmmakers who make and market our own films. We do not provide any financial support for production, finishing funds or distribution advances.


A traditional distributor. New Day Films accepts films and the filmmaker who made them. We do not distribute your film for you.


An employer. As a co-op of independent filmmakers, we do not have staff members.



Our History

"New Day Films is the artistic antidote to mainstream media. I fully support their positive adventuresome spirit of independent cinema."
- Haskell Wexler, A.S.C.
Academy Award Winning Cinematographer and Director


New Day Films: Since 1971
New Day was the first distributor to be run entirely by and for film-makers. "Until we put it together," says founding member Liane Brandon, "no one thought filmmakers could distribute films - no one thought the world was ready for feminist political films."

Fellow founder Amalie Rothschild describes New Day's difference for filmmakers: "New Day put me in touch with the totality, the wholeness of being a filmmaker. Making a film is only half the job. The other half is getting it seen, especially if you make films to change minds, to promote ideas you passionately believe in."

During the past few years, New Day has streamlined its operations to accommodate changes in the industry, such as the switch from 16 mm film to VHS cassettes as the dominant educational media format. With a large and diverse group of makers to consider marketing decisions, New Day member J Clements says that "New Day has done tremendously well with change. Members care most about promoting films, so promotion is close to our hearts. New Day is in a strong position compared to other distributors because we have members, and other distributors don't."

Jenny Cool, one of New Day's newest members, agrees: "New Day is impressive. It's hard to be in something for twenty-five years and still feel jazzed about it, but New Day members do. Often there's no mechanism to get knowledge from people with years of experience to newcomers. New Day is about the only organization I know that transmits collective wisdom effectively. It's a highly organized and efficient group, yet it still has a community feel."

We hope you'll feel part of New Day's community in this special year. We invite you to contact us with ideas, comments, and suggestions that will help us make the next twenty-five years even better.

The Members of New Day Films