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Offshore Press, Inc. (of Kansas) is a family owned publishing company that has been in business since 1981. The business is owned by Vernon K. Jacobs, his wife and two grown daughters. The name was changed from Research Press, Inc. to Offshore Press, Inc. (Kansas) as of May 16, 2000. The business began as a way to distribute books and reports written by Vernon Jacobs when he was the Editor of Tax Angles, a large circulation tax strategy newsletter published by Kephart Communications of Alexandria, VA. At the present time, the company is technically a "minority owned enterprise" because Vernon's wife and two daughters own 60% of the stock. From about 1984 through 1989, the company focused on developing and marketing various tax planning worksheet templates developed by Jacobs. The first was a comprehensive income tax planning tool for individuals, corporations and trusts. Another worksheet was designed to calculate the tax on distributions from a qualified retirement plan, taking into account the impact of the 15% excise tax on excess plan distributions - which has subsequently been repealed. Other worksheets that were developed and sold included "TotalTax", "DivorceTax" and "AudiTax". The TotalTax worksheet compared the tax burden on doing business as a proprietor, partner, S corp and and C corp owner. The DivorceTax worksheet analyzed alternative methods of divorce settlements for the purpose of securing the best arrangement for both parties. The AuditTax worksheet provided a quick method of estimating and/or verifying a proposed audit adjustment by the IRS. Numerous other smaller worksheets were also developed and sold. The market for spreadsheet templates was short lived and by 1989, it was extremely difficult to sell worksheets in the form of spreadsheet templates. In January, 1989, the company embarked on the newsletter publishing business by launching "The Jacobs Report on Investment and Retirement Tax Strategies". In 1990, 1991 and 1992, back issues of the newsletter were compiled into a book called "The Zero Tax Portfolio Manual". Sensing an opportunity to capitalize on a new specialty in the legal profession, the focus of the newsletter was changed to asset protection in early 1993. The name was changed to The Jacobs Report On Asset Protection Strategies, a monthly newsletter on legal methods of protecting assets from future lawsuits. In late 1994, the company established its first web site, consisting of a copy of its catalog. In 1995, the first web site was replaced by a larger web site called Financial Solutions Online. The name of that publication was changed in April, 2000 to Offshore Internet Digest. A major redesign of the web site occurred in mid-1997, with a shift to the use of tables to facilitate navigation between different parts of the web site. In early 1997, the company agreed to produce an email tax newsletter to be distributed by another electronic publisher, but after six month, it was clearly not generating enough subscriptions to justify the time to produce it. The company changed the focus of the publication from a tax newsletter to a series of tax research reports on legal methods of tax avoidance - called "Vern Jacobs' Tax Solutions". Early in 1997, the company agreed to provide publishing and marketing services for OFFSHORE, an eJournal, - an email service written and distributed by Arnold Cornez, J.D. A few months later, the asset protection forum was modified to incorporate offshore topics. Early in 1998, the company agreed to take over full publishing and editing duties so that Arnold Cornez could devote more time to his legal practice. The name of the publication was changed to The Offshore Journal. In mid-1998, the company sponsored a public email discussion forum on asset protection and offshore topics. The next major overhaul of the web site occurred during the first half of 1998 when the web site was changed to make use of frames, background images, some graphic images, a search engine and various other features selected to make the web site easier to use. In addition, a separate web site for paid subscribers was expanded and a separate web site was established for each newsletter published by the company. Later in 1998, the company concluded that "Vern Jacobs' Tax Solutions" was not generating any substantial interest, and since Vernon Jacobs had decided to focus his tax accounting services on offshore/international tax services, the newsletter was changed to also focus on offshore and/or international tax issues.