First, a confession: I subscribe to the Sunday Chronicle. I pay a dollar a week, and I receive the following items:
- Grocery coupons,
- A moderately reliable TV guide, and
- A plastic bag to shovel cat poop into
They arrive on my driveway every Sunday morning, carefully cushioned by many layers of wet newsprint.
Despite my patronage of Houston’s Leading Information Source, I am bombarded weekly with mail ads asking me to subscribe. The one I got last night takes the cake:
Add Thursday, Friday and Saturday delivery for 25 cents a week!
I was floored. By the Chronicle’s own admission, the marginal value of a weekday newspaper is $0.08.
It, quite literally, isn’t worth a dime.
Filed Under ChronBiased, Front Page ·
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38 Responses to “Chron admits it’s not worth a dime”Search
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You’re fired.
Been trying stop delivery of that rancid left wing rag ever since our subscription expired late 2007 - but still arrives (wet) every day.
You are right - bag great for scooping the poop - coupons at weekend, otherwise goes straight into the recycling container.
This is as good a thread as any to mention the fact that Mr. Bramanti and I have been working on a special “project” that would require the help of LST readers to pull off.
Suffice it to say… if you are receiving unsubscribed to, unpaid for, unwanted copies of the Houston Chronicle on your front lawn…. set up a special bin in your garage (I’m using an old laundry basket) and start collecting them (keep in plastic wrap).
Do not dispose; just hold on to them and await further instructions.
Note–this ONLY applies to papers that have been thrown on your lawn WITHOUT your consent.
#2 - Who do think’s wetting on it? (tee hee hee)
#3 Done
#4 Not my dawg - he uses a neighbors yard - the one with the BO sign in it.
Hell, I get the grocery fliers wrapped in plastic thrown onto my lawn, WEEKLY, for free. I wish I could stop them from littering my yard, but I don’t have enough clout.
Matt you failed to list all the other benefits that the Crummyicle brings to you and other readers. So I have comprised a list of the “Top Ten” things you inadvertently omitted:
1) “Sales Ads” that your “better half” can use to buy things and thereby save you money.
2) “Sports Section” which will show you how your sales tax dollars are providing a “working place” for spoiled atheletes to play.
3) “Winning Lottery Numbers” to entice you to throw away your money. Oh, I’m sorry, to help education (per Ma Richards).
4) “Editorial Section” to show you there are ignorant people out there who have very liberal view of things.
5) “Employment Section” to provide alternatives, just in case that LST gig isn’t paying enough.
6) “Obituary Section” so that you know if any of your friends (or enemies) has died without telling you.
7) “Comics Section” which is suppose to bring humor to an otherwise scary world.
9) “Business Section” to show you whose screwing who in the business world and what CEO is cheating his company.
10) “World News” to see how bad things are outside the good ole USA.
Now tell me, isn’t all this worth that one thin “dime”
I do just the opposite — subscribe to every day EXCEPT Sunday. Sunday papers are a total waste: 0% news, lots of sports that I never read, lots of ads that I never look at, lots of comics I never look at. Did you know that 99% of the Sunday paper is printed and sitting in the warehouse by Wednesday night? They keep open the front page of the front section — just in case there is important news — and the sports section, for late-breaking scores. That’s it. Why should I have to throw away 5 pounds of paper and ink every week when I get real news on the Net or TV?
The curious thing is, they give me no price break at all for no Sunday delivery. That means the value of the Sunday paper must be zero!
I am really upset, Matt pays a dollar a year=$52.00 yr. The *(Y^& Chronicle charges me $60.00 yr. What’s wrong with this picture!
Blackgirl, just call and tell them you want a better deal. They’ll give it to you.
Correction to #9 -Matt pays a dollar a week.
I am going to call them!
Ok I reread the post, Matt only get’s the Sunday paper, I get the entire week.
It’s not only not worth a dime, it’s not worth….well….you know what it’s not worth.
A nickle ain’t worth a dime anymore either.
We used to subscribe to weekends only, but then our carrier told us we had to subscribe for the whole week. So we cancelled.
blackgirl: You might try just telling them you don’t want to pay for it anymore. It is very hard to cancel a sub, they need you more than you need them so they just keep it coming. I’ve been getting it everyday for over 8 years and haven’t paid a cent. They don’t even send a notice or a collector…..just the paper. I figure I’m paying about what it’s worth.
I’ll do it David, but I’m out in the boonies and it doesn’t happen that often……. however count me in on the operation.
The Crummyicle will make any kind of deal to keep you as a subscriber because it is that subscription number that determines what their ad rate will be. And by the looks of things, the ad price should be pretty low. I subscribe for a daily paper and I use it for a whole of other things that helps me recoup my subscription price. I would think finding out some purchase is cheaper at one store than another would be worth the price. You can’t be driving everywhere looking for a bargain.
Lovely Daughter’s school was in some “Project Graduation” or something like that, and part of it was a free paper. When she graduated fifth grade, I expected either the paper to stop coming or for someone to convert us a subscription. Most of the papers were thrown out unread. I LIKE the comics.
Two years later, we received a card asking if she was still in the school. I replied honestly and sent it back.
One year later, we received the same card. Again, I told them that she no longer qualified for a free paper.
Finally, about a year or so after that, the papers stopped arriving.
#18, we ran an ad some months back in the horse section and the ad was three lines-7days for fifty something dollars. Is that low?
#20
Depends. Did you sell the horse?
Yet I bet you get on chron.com atleast once a day…
houstondem: don’t know who you’re directing this to, but I don’t….haven’t been there in years, too boring. But at least it’s free.
#22
Yep - same price as the paper though
wfish, yes but the sell did not come from the ad!
correction to 25 “sale”
HoustonDem, it doesn’t matter how many hits a website gets a day if the advertisers don’t see any results when they poll their customers on where they got their info from.
So?
blackgirl:
glad you sold the horse, but I think that answers the question of was it worth a fifty-something dollar ad in the Chronicle want ads. I’ve got a neighbor trying to sell a Harley but said when he called the Chron about placing an ad, they wanted such a high price, he went to the Green Sheet. Don’t know if he has sold it yet, but I didn’t see it last weekend.
Think Matt’s right on that one - whether they give the paper away for 25c a week and you dont read it or whether its for free on the Internet kind of makes no difference to their bottom line or thier biz plan.
Their revenue stream is the not subscribers its ad revenue which means they have an incentive to give it away - even if you dont want it.
From that perspective, and forgive me from getting into LST’s Biz here, I guess its not a great leap to be able to say to a potential advertiser that LST has same on-line reach as Chron.com - i.e. if you have a computer - you are a subscriber
You bet. We’re also far more eco-friendly than the Chron.
Yet I bet you get on nakedalbinomidgets.com once a day.
So?
31 Matt
But the dangerous levels of Benzion are pretty high!
Can’t afford to let that stuff get into the groundwater.
“Yet I bet you get on nakedalbinomidgets.com once a day.”
HAHAHA- that is just too funny!
John Kerry voted for nakedalbinomidgets.com before he voted against nakedalbinomidgets.com.
Company firewall wouldn’t let me get to nakedalbinomidgets.com
but we did get access to
swedishinterns4hillary.com
REMEMBER… SAVE ALL UNSOLICITED HOUSTON CHRONICLES WITHIN THEIR ORIGINAL PLASTIC WRAP… AWAIT FURTHER INSTRUCTIONS…
I have SEVEN unsolicited Houston Chronicles in my driveway right now (and my son had thrown out 5 last garbage day). I’ve been leaving them to see just how many have to pile up before the stupid paper thrower can figure out that I do not want them.
I have had to call twice in the past years to make them stop throwing. My plan this time was to send the circulation head guy a picture and certified letter stating not to throw again, then to file both littering and harassment charges against HC WHEN they throw another one (because you know they will!).
But now I’ll wait to see what Mr B has planned. Let us know - I won’t be able to get into my driveway soon!