When I was in college, I decided to subscribe to Reader’s Digest. My parents had always gotten it, and I enjoyed reading the stories and jokes. I’ve had a subscription ever since, over 25 years now.
I could always expect a new issue every month and knew about when it might arrive. However, a few years ago, the magazine cut back to ten issues a year. They take August and December off; the other ones aren’t any larger, and my price didn’t go down.
This is not just a mirage, but a trend. I’ve also been a subscriber to Sports Illustrated for a long time. That was a weekly magazine for decades. A few years ago, though, they went to bi-weekly. And now it’s dropped to one issue a month. Sometimes you’ll get a larger issue, depending on the focus of that month. At least with SI, they have extended the length of my subscription as a result.
With a sports magazine, this is very understandable. SI used to have stories about what happened the previous week, but with the internet offering that coverage, most people don’t want or need to wait until the following week. Now, the editors offer more long-form writing, with in-depth coverage of a variety of sports topics. It’s actually very enjoyable; I even read a great story about how sled dogs helped carry vaccines to remote parts of Alaska before there were other good ways to get there!
But Reader’s Digest? This is a bad sign. There is no shortage of material for that magazine, but this is surely a cost-cutting sign. Plain and simple, the age of print could be coming to an end.
People consume so much content on the internet that print publications often have to take a hard look at the services they offer. If people aren’t subscribing to your publication, but they are looking at the material online, where will you focus your funding?
For a long time, the Star Tribune would let you look at five articles a month for free. So I looked at five on my phone, five on my computer at home, five on my computer at work… The folks in charge there have figured out this scam, and now you can’t access any material without a subscription. (Except for Covid coverage; they’ve been keeping that open.)
I finally caved and got an online subscription when they offered a good deal. There’s something nice about having a consistent paper to look at every single day, even if it’s on my phone or computer.
We used to get that with the Owatonna People’s Press. The only day it wasn’t published was Mondays, similar to other newspapers. We would get it delivered in the morning and read it with our breakfast. It was a simple routine that brought us pleasure.
Then they stopped morning delivery and sent it through the mail. Okay, I got it, they didn’t have people interested in paper routes anymore.
Then they merged Saturday and Sunday into one paper. Well, with mail delivery, I wasn’t getting the Sunday paper until Monday anyway.
Then they cut out the Friday paper. So now we get the OPP Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, and Saturday. They’ve also basically merged with the Faribault paper since I see at least as many stories about Faribault and Northfield as I do anything in Steele County.
And the price went up.
Newspapers and magazines are dying, at least in the print form. Oh, don’t worry, they won’t go away completely, not for some time at least. But these periodicals make their money through advertisers mainly; your subscription costs help cover some parts, but they really need advertisers. And advertisers won’t pay as much if there aren’t eyeballs on their ads. So as readership declines in print, so does the ability of the periodical to continue publishing.
I actually think the small-town papers like the one you’re reading are better off than the bigger organizations. Small towns tend to have a very loyal following and also publish stories about local events that you can’t find elsewhere. I like reading the city council reports for our area towns; I know that I for sure won’t see the Ellendale council report in the OPP unless something really major happens. Plus, small-town readers enjoy the feel-good stories that their papers offer. Perhaps you even enjoy reading some of the unique columns that appear!
I still get the Star Tribune delivered on Sunday mornings. There is something so wonderful about sitting down and reading the paper those mornings. I do the same with the Star-Eagle on Thursdays when I get home. It’s relaxing and gratifying to hold the paper in my hands instead of staring at a screen to read.
I keep wondering what will happen first: print publication will go away or I’ll run out of ideas to write in this space. I hope you’ll keep subscribing so it’s more likely that the latter will happen first!
Word of the Week: This week’s word is misocainea, which means a hatred of new ideas, as in, “His misocainea as the paper switched to mail instead of home delivery was evident in his angry call to the publisher.” Impress your friends and confuse your enemies!