My bio (laid back version)

Kevin Benoit...
I started Parlé when I was 17 years old in my first year of college. The only real print media experience I had was from starting my own high school newspaper and the summer after h.s. graduation I interned with a startup magazine basically helping him get contacts and try to get the publication off the ground. That magazine never launched.

I was in school for legal studies and never intended for a career in media, but while at John Jay I was getting a financial aid refund check every month I was in school. It was a good look, but I was spending the money without a care. After I’d spent the first few checks I stopped myself and told myself that I need to invest it in something that would impact my future once I was out of college. I was sitting in English class one day in early April 2004 and it all came together in that hour. I came up with the name, the concept, the slogan (not your average) and all I had to do was figure out how much it would cost.

By May 4, 2004 my first issue was out on the streets. A lot of the contacts I had found while I was interning for that other publication turned out to be the contacts for most of the features early on, and a lot of those same people are still in touch with me. Even though I had the refund check I had to have my girlfriend at the time, put the cost of the issue on her credit card. I think I gave her a couple hundred but she paid for a majority of it.

When I first started I had no idea what I was doing. I used to cut and paste my articles onto a sheet of paper because I didn’t know what photoshop was or how to graphic design. I didn’t have a camera or photographer so the companies had to provide everything. It was just a really big learning process for me. I’m still learning. I believe that you shouldn’t think too long or hard about things though, if you want to do it, just do it!!! Make mistakes, learn from them but keep doing. I know people who were talking about starting something around the same time I started Parlé…and their still talking. All that talking is for losers!

I just turned 23 in 2010, and I've been doing the mag almost 6 years. Not quite where I wanted to after 5+ years, but its here, and I’m not stopping until I am where I want to be, and even then…can’t stop, wont stop.

My apologies

I'm sorry for being so neglectful towards the blog, things are just sooo busy right now with the magazine. If you follow the blog and look forward to my posts please check out the website www.parlemagazine.com as it has been getting most of my attention and will get a majority of my posts.
Thank you
-Kevin Benoit

Annual Parlé State of Affairs Address

Every year around this time I do the annual Parlé address on the state of things with the magazine, the poetry tour and my life hoping to give people some insight on things. This year the address is slightly different, but just as important. I'd like ot think you can get something from it.

Anyone who knows me personally, I mean really knows me, knows I have a tendency to be quite weird. While everyone approaches a new year with positivity and with a fresh outlook, the first thing I think about when New Years comes around is 'whether this will be the year I die.' I constantly remind myself that the next day isn't promised, that old age isn't to be automatically expected. That might not be the best approach for everyone but for me its what keeps me going even when I may want to quit.

This year death got closer and closer to home, though it decided to skip our door once again. I still saw a lot of people pass and saw people get sick that may not recover. It's a sad world like that and any day it may be my turn, but everyday I ask myself what I'm doing to impact the world before it is my turn.

Every year I do this hoping that maybe a few people will be impacted and motivated to do something. Most of the time you never get a chance to realize who you impact, but in the last week alone I spoke to someone in prison that found Parlé and became inspired, and I also spoke to a magazine editor out in CANADA that read my address last year and used that as inspiration to create their own. It doesn't take much to make me happy, and those 2 things were more than enough to make the end to my year spectacular.

This Parlé grind has been good this year. Issues dropped on time, changed the look, got a few ads, visited a few states, met some nice people, made some new friends. I'm STILL not where I want to be, but I'm progressing everyday. Hopefully I'm making the people around me better too. Opening up doors for them that they didn't know were possible, showing the fam the potential, showing my team that the grind is all worth it. At the end of the day I don't do this for me, I do it for all those people around me, those I can see and touch on every given day as well as those I haven't met yet but may know of me or might get to know me. It's true, life is short, and we are small specs in the overall of things but our impact and our ability to reach grows a lot further than we could ever imagine and ever see. May I impact you and may you take that and impact as many people as you possibly can.

-Kevin Benoit
www.parlemagazine.com


2009's highlights
~Went from printing a total black and white issue in Jan/Feb on newsprint to save money to printing 2 issues in full color on magazine quality paper by December

~Parlé celebrated its 5th Anniversary in May of this year

~Interviewed Birdman in Miami, best weekend in Parlé history

~The Parlé Poetry Tour expanded its reach to several new states including California, Michigan, and Texas

~Returning to HarlemLIVE, though briefly happy to have gone full circle

~Launched Parlé's Females of Poetry Tour, a 3 year goal finally achieved

~Interviewed R. Kelly and got him on a cover

~Launching the website www.parlemagazine.com

In 2010 I'm going to interview Diddy, you can tell him I said it