Statesman to raise prices
Don @ IdahoRadioNews | May 31, 2009
The Idaho Statesman will soon charge you 50% more to purchase a copy of the daily paper from a newsrack or store – and 33% more on Sunday. This follows a series of home delivery increases – though the Statesman isn’t raising those rates right now.
This is the latest in a series of moves from Idaho’s largest daily this year: layoffs, wage freezes, a reduction in paper size, outsourcing of printing and expense reductions.
As Bloomberg notes, the Statesman is just following the crowd with is rate increase.
And in an odd twist, publisher Mi-Ai Parrish equated her newspaper to Crystal Light. The jokes write themselves.
Related: Maker of newspaper vending boxes feels plight of newspaper industry
UPDATE: The Boise Guardian’s Dave Frazier caught THIS in Sunday’s paper. (Read the first word of the headline realllly closely). Oh man.
Who in the world runs this business???
Economics 101: When business is down or competition is taking your desired market share, then you lower prices and increase marketing efforts. Increased market share at lower margins far outwieghs no market share at all. Offer a product that encourages customer loyalty and you are much more likely to withstand future price increases.
Case in point: The oil industry forced the increase in oil prices but limiting production. The result: consumers bought less gas driving the prices down again.
Now, more readers will cancel subscriptions and the cost per reader to purchase advertsing skyrockets. They lose on both ends. Certainly there can’t be a capitalist at the helm… but then again, it is a newspaper.
A rise in prices? Not a problem. Might as well get as much as you can from the few customers and readers they have left….. before they close the door or go on-line only…. I could not believe my eyes when I saw that notice regarding the price increase. Jim is right on the mark. Here on the homefront, our cancelation will be forthcoming when they increase the subscription rates……………….then its goodbye for good.!
Maybe the last remaining writers at the Statesman should bundle their money together and purchase a Tidbits franchise (or something like it) and work on developing it into a local paper. Currently, there seems to be more value (and interest) for the money in a free paper that has only trivia and entertainment value than one gets from what was once a statewide publishing powerhouse that used to garner respect.
Sadly, what we are all watching is the dying gasp of what was a reputable newspaper. If one can remember the Statesman from what it once was and now is….you realize that the process of de-evolution is in full swing.
First of all, why should I pay for a paper that has such poor judgment to allow a headline of that kind to be published? I shouldn’t. Raising the price per copy will not begin to cover the cost of product on a per copy or even per edition basis.
Ideally, improving the quality of the product by providing quality news that is not available any place else is the first best solution, but that costs money and requires a stronger investment in and commitment to the community. I don’t think that is going to happen. There is no real incentive to try.
I say fold up the tent and go off into the sunset. Maybe – maybe – leave a few people employed to manage what is left of the online product.
Unfortunately, this silliness is not limited to The Statesman. The N.Y. Times just increased its single copy price from $1.50 to $2.00. Other papers are doing similar things.
Hey, newspaper owners: if there’s a better way to chase the dwindling number of readers you have out the door than increasing the price by 33% to 50%, I can’t imagine what it could be, especially in a recession with people being laid off by the thousands. Give them yet another reason to stop buying your product? GREAT idea!
The only other job I’ve had other than radio was that of a newspaper carrier for “the local newpaper” while in junior high and high school. Back then I didn’t have to know who GOT the paper, but who DIDN’T since 99% of the neighborhood “got it daily”. (remember the bumper sticker campaign way back when?) I had to collect for the subscriptions every month and I can remember how ticked of people got when they raised the 4-week rate from $3.35 to $3.50! LOL Or maybe that was my starting wage at my first radio gig and what my first raise went to. Oh, them were the days.
economics 101 drop the price of your product because your competitor has or has the current upper hand pplleeaassee!! All that does is devalue the market and your product. Ok ok before you say it the Statesman is not as it once was but…..it is only 1 of 2 papers and rather I prefer the Tribune over the Statesman does not matter. WE CANNOT HAVE A MONOPOLY!!! Then where will subscription prices and single copy or advertising price go?? In radio the market is ruined because of stations trying to get the almighty dollar (yes that does pay your mortgage) prices and station value are out the door. GSM’s will deny but it’s the truth. And it does not help that your competitors will go lower than your bottom line take it or get the heck outta here price just to say look at me ha ha. Heck if I was a business owner I would take advantage of the situation too!
But raising the price or keeping the product value might save the paper. Sooner or later being the cheapest might come back and haunt you even if you have gone through your competitors (speaking of radio stations) I am in the radio business as many of you read this are. I personally have benefited from my competition selling cheap, giving poor customer service, overbooking their logs, lying to customers, treating it as a second rate station even though it was your best booking for your whole cluster (yes yes we know who that is). Where am I getting ???? Mainting their value or raising their prices wether the Statesman puts out a poor product or not because of their opinions or cutbacks does not de value them. I respect them! They are making a statement. Wether that bankrupts them or not time will tell. The economy is turning slowly but surely and things will level out and the cheapest will have become percieved cheap and those who have maintained there value will have become respected.
So the Statesman is the same price as the NY times? Seems fair..
And by the way, for people on unemployment that buy the sunday paper for jobs…this seems slightly ironic and unfair. You think they would want to help people get jobs.
Demand drives the print market the same as any other. Provide a product people demand at the RIGHT price and you will survive. Provide a product people don’t need or want at the WRONG price, you will fail. First thing you learn about in ECON101. The auto industry has been and will even more so be a great illustration of this in coming months/years……
I think “Radioactive” is being way too kind. He refers to the Statesman as a “publishing powerhouse that used to garner respect.” I’ve been subjected to the Statesman for over 3 decades now, and at the same time have lived in many other parts of the country. The Statesman was a joke in the 70’s, the 80’s, the 90’s and now. I recently found some old copies from the early 90’s that had been used as packing material. Back then I was living in San Jose and used to come home often to visit. THE WORST part of visiting Boise was being subjected to that rediculous newspaper. I looked thru those old papers, remembering how terrible they were at the time and came to realize that they were pretty good compared to what lands on my doorstep today.
The Idaho Statesman is a good example of Idaho media. Local TV news is pathetic, kind of like having a bunch of high school kids do the news. Radio here is has a few highlights but for the most part its automated or syndicated drivel. Guess we should just except the fact that we are, and shall remain, small town.
Maybe its all for the best. When people get old they become senile and it makes it easier to let them go. The Statesman is about as senile as a media outlet can be. And I am, as a result, not going to miss them too much.