The International Regional Magazine Association conference was held earlier this week in Santa Fe, New Mexico. The program included the IRMA awards and Canadian magazines Cottage Life, Prairies North and B.C. Magazine all walked away winners.

Cottage Life was awarded nine awards including Magazine of the Year, over 40,000 circulation for their May, June and Summer 2008 issues. Editor Penny Caldwell says that they’re thrilled to have won. “The competition is stiff particularly in the design area,” she says. “There is beautiful photography that comes from some of the travel magazines. To win the overall art direction for our circulation category was really exciting and of course we were really pleased to win magazine of the year.”

B.C. Magazine took home four awards and an award of merit, editor Anita Willis says they were delighted to win. “IRMA are a wonderful, highly professional group of magazines and to come away with two gold and two silver and an award of merit — we’re very pleased.”

Prairies North was awarded one gold and an award of merit. The wins come at the end of a tough year for the magazine which has downsized and streamlined due to the economy. “The IRMA awards are always very important to us because when we are in other competitions we’re dealing with magazines of all genres but when we are down there we’re competing with people who are in our category,” says editor Lionel Hughes. “When you walk away with an award from IRMA you have a sense you’ve been compared to the best in the world and judged by some very high caliber people.”

Caldwell says she enjoys the IRMA conference because of the friendly atmosphere and willingness to exchange ideas. “People are happy to share ideas, even numbers,” she says. “People will help you understand how a program can work at one magazine and adapt it to yours. I really encourage any regional magazines who aren’t involved to get involved with IRMA.”

Those who couldn’t attend the conference can visit IRMA’s new Facebook group by following this link or going to their website, Regionalmagazines.org.