Better, Not Bitter
Described by The New York Times as “a kind of kitchen-sink New Yorker,” The Bitter Southerner began as a digital magazine and evolved into print. Ali Dening spoke to cofounder Kyle Tibbs Jones on how the magazine got its start.
“Our goal was to tell the truth — to lift voices that weren’t being heard, and tell stories that were not being shared.”
The Bitter Southerner began with four people and a feeling in the dining room of a 105-year-old house in Atlanta.
The four people were Kyle Tibbs Jones, Chuck Reece, Dave Whitling, and Butler Raines.
Kyle Tibbs Jones, cofounder and editorial director of The Bitter Southerner
The feeling, cofounder Chuck Reece wrote, was that “the work of Southerners still exists under a shadow, no matter how many great things we create. This pissed us off. Made us bitter, as it were.”
This “bitterness” spurred The Bitter Southerner’s founders into action. They turned out their pockets, upended their purses, and even sold that 105-year-old house. They made time around their day jobs to build something that they believed in.
The eventual result would be a print magazine that captures the incredible vibrancy of the South’s various interwoven cultures—a collection of stories that acknowledge the region’s painful history but refuse to let it define the South’s future.
Cofounder Kyle Tibbs Jones explained that The Bitter Southerner has always been a name “said with a wink.”
“It has always been about being better, not bitter,” Tibbs Jones said. “Our idea was that the South never seemed to get its due on lists and at award shows, and that Hollywood's portrayal of Southerners—well, they mostly got it wrong (she’s quick to note that things have thankfully improved on that front since 2013).
“I think because we created something authentic and true, our followers and readers were passionate about sharing The Bitter Southerner with their friends and families.”
“In the beginning, we jokingly claimed ‘we were bitter’ and that we were going to set the record straight. [We wanted to] tell stories about all the people in this region doing really amazing, smart, and creative things. And we did.”
But, Tibbs Jones explained, the passion project wasn’t without its obstacles. The Bitter Southerner was started with zero funding, and to this day has never taken on investors. For the first 52 weeks of the magazine’s existence, every writer, photographer, and illustrator that contributed to TBS received no financial reward. They worked simply because they thought that the publication should exist.
In the same vein, Tibbs Jones adds, its audience was built “100% organically” via social media, email, and word of mouth.
“I think because we created something authentic and true, our followers and readers were passionate about sharing The Bitter Southerner with their friends and families. People recognized themselves in what we were saying and publishing. They hadn’t heard this voice in the media before.
“Our goal was to tell the truth—to lift voices that weren't being heard, and tell the stories that were not being shared.”
Five months after The Bitter Southerner’s birth in 2013, its platform had grown to 5,000 newsletter subscribers—with thousands more followers on social media. By the end of its first year, it had 12,000 subscribers. By 2017, its web page had 100,000 visitors a month. Today, it boasts a worldwide readership, a print magazine, a book publishing imprint, The Batch podcast, and a slew of awards.
“We have a rock n’ roll business model, we are a band with a merch table.”
But its backbone has always been its merch. In the early days, to keep itself afloat, The Bitter Southerner maintained an online store that sold TBS swag. Tibbs Jones stands by it, calling the T-shirt shop the magazine’s “best, most important move” in its eleven year history.
“Our followers and readers were so passionate about the stories and our movement (because that is what it was and is—a movement!). They wanted to wear the brand. We had TBS evangelists all over the world and all over social media and we were creating the income we needed to pay our contributors.”
Despite the publication’s regional focus, it speaks to people everywhere.
“We still receive letters from people who tell us how much [The Bitter Southerner] means to them, along with stories about being in Japan or Peru or wherever and running into a fellow Bitter Southerner wearing the gear,” Tibbs Jones said. “The three of us [founders] laugh and say we have a rock n’ roll business model—we are a band with a merch table.”
In 2021, The Bitter Southerner launched its “pride and joy,” a completely reader-supported triannual print magazine. So far, there have been eight issues (some of them currently sold out!) and the founders have no plans to stop producing them anytime soon.
“As progressives who want the South and this country to be better, and as journalists who care deeply about social justice and authentic stories told at the highest level,” Tibbs Jones said, “we are called to do this work.”
Issue No. 9 of The Bitter Southerner began shipping on September 20th, and is available for purchase here.
