CEO’s Message – February 2026
From Mailboxes to Inboxes: Staying Connected With Your Cooperative
It’s very likely you’re reading this article in the February edition of Ohio Cooperative Living magazine — a physical paper magazine. Most members prefer receiving the magazine by mail and read it regularly. If I’m right, and you’re reading the physical magazine, you likely agree. At the same time, a growing amount of media is consumed online, whether on smartphones, tablets, or computers.
For this column, and the rest of the monthly magazine, the Union Rural Electric Cooperative (URE) communications staff and I need to plan way ahead. This is because with print media, like Ohio Cooperative Living, it takes additional time to go to press, print, and mail thousands of copies to homes and businesses. It might interest you to know that, as I’m drafting this article for the February issue, it is currently three days before Christmas 2025. Most of the time, this long lead time works out fine. We generally know exactly what we want to communicate, even a month in advance. Sometimes, though, being timely is more important than sticking to a plan.
We tend to use social media for urgent communications, since they allow immediate messaging. Often, we share important news, ranging from youth programs to outage status, on Facebook, X, and Instagram. With social media, we can get a message out to a large audience, both non-members and members of URE alike. And once in a while, we want to communicate just to our members, and we want to be able to do it fairly quickly, especially when the information can’t wait for print.
This past summer, you may have noticed that we began sending a monthly email newsletter mid-month with timely news from URE. It’s called Watt Matters, and if you haven’t seen it, it may have been a victim of your spam filter — take a look and make sure it’s not blocked. It will come from [email protected]. To make sure you receive it, add this email address to your safe sender list. This email newsletter provides information in a way that many people appreciate getting it, timely and digitally. It allows us to send information out quickly when a hot topic just can’t wait a month to hit the press.
The initial few Watt Matters digital newsletters have addressed member concerns about data centers and energy pricing, explained power bills, shared updates on URE and staff, and announced upcoming youth programs and scholarships. Check out Watt Matters when you read your email — it’s a great way to stay up to date.
Whether it’s keeping up with your electric cooperative by reading the print magazine, social media, or our e-newsletter, keep in mind that you’re more than a customer of URE; you’re a member. That means you play an important role in the company. Engagement by members like you is what sets URE apart from other utility companies. You can participate in URE by voting in co-op elections, speaking out about energy-related issues to government officials, and interacting with us in a productive way on social media.
Lastly, don’t forget that we’re only a click away. There aren’t too many easier web addresses to remember. You can easily find years of the digital version of the Ohio Cooperative Living magazine archive online, as well as recent CEO articles featured in our Watt Matters e-newsletter. Our website also has a wealth of information about our company — from rates, programs, and career opportunities to SmartHub and the latest outage updates.
Basically, we just want to make it as easy as possible for you to get the information you need, whether that’s by going to your mailbox, your inbox, or your web browser. After all, Education and information are more than just one of our core cooperative values, it’s part of the Cooperative Advantage.