El Salto Community | The accounts of El Salto: growing from storm to storm – El Salto

In the fifth year of the project, El Salto has taken a new step towards its consolidation, although the crisis and inflation are beginning to hit us hard. After overcoming the barrier of 8,200 subscribers, in 2021 we managed to enter up to 19.85% more than in the previous year and 15.7% more than before the pandemic. But it has not been easy and what is to come will be less easy.

They have been two very hard years, marked by the fall of some traditional income, such as the direct sale of magazines —which has become residual—, those linked to events or advertising —always ethical—, which has cost them to recover from the slump pandemic. However, the support of our community in the most difficult times has allowed us to weather the storm and end the last three years with a certain balance between expenses and income. And we have not done it by hiding until the worst is over, but risking everything to try to be useful in the unfolding social crisis. And to a large extent we have achieved it: now we have a more powerful medium, with greater capacity for influence, with much more and better content, especially on the web, and with established video and radio projects.

However, in the last year, more than 7,000 euros of losses have been registered, a small deficit that should not worry us if it were not for the fact that the trend in the last quarter of 2021 has been accentuated at the beginning of 2022: a generalized increase of the prices and expenses necessary to carry out El Salto, especially those related to staff, printing and distribution.

In these three months of 2022, spending on printing has already increased by 35% and spending on personnel has grown due to new hires and the 8.6% rise in wages, an attempt to alleviate the loss of purchasing power of a staff that barely earns more than the minimum interprofessional salary. If between 2019 and 2021, the salary expense increased by 24%, in 2022 it will do so much more. It never hurts to remember that all the people who work in El Salto are paid the same.

The increase in expenses in the last year is also due to a strong commitment to new hiring of journalists to cover a national and international context in permanent crisis. These hirings and increases in working hours have prioritized the territorial axis and now we have journalists hired in País Valencià, País Vasco and Andalucía.

Where does the income of El Salto come from?

The distribution of El Salto’s income is a window to see how this communicative project works and what we mean when we say that we are independent —economically independent, that goes without saying—. 76% of El Salto’s money comes from the support of people subscribed through their membership fees and support bonuses.

The parallel activities that we carry out through Edita —editorial services, video and training— generate 7.3% of the budget, while advertising in the magazine and on the web contributes 6.5%, advertising limited to those companies that do not violate human, environmental, social or labor rights.

In addition, this year we have carried out the Sphera project, financed by the European Union, which has allowed us to make dozens of videos with total editorial independence. In total, this project and other subsidies have contributed 5.3% of the El Salto budget.

In the last three years we have achieved a certain balance between expenses and income but with an increasingly powerful project, capable of better covering the current situation and the situation of permanent crisis that we have had to live through. If it seemed difficult to imagine anything worse than 2020 and 2021, this year promises new surprises. In El Salto we will do everything necessary to be up to the task.