A paid paper is a read paper

I’d like to clear up one misunderstanding which some people have about our industry. A paid paper is a read paper. Many of the weeklies and bi-weeklies years ago went with the model of giving away their paper for free in order to boost circulation numbers and at the same time jacking their advertising rates based on the number of copies which hit the street.

I’ve never been convinced that giving away a newspaper means that the person receiving it doesn’t immediately pitch it in their blue box.

A previous newspaper I was at was a free weekly in Alberta. It was 2007/08 and things were great there — tons of advertising, no competitor and an economy that was rocking and rolling.

I rented a basement suite in the low-rental part of town and would walk Milo, my dog, several times each day because we didn’t have a fenced-in backyard.

Our newspaper hit the streets on Fridays and the carriers placed them in a plastic tube and tied it to the mailboxes (as most of the units in our subdivision were identical.) I’d often notice the papers still hanging on the mailboxes by Tuesday or Wednesday of the following week.

And it was a strong product — on average 108-pages, tabloid size.

The young woman who lived upstairs from me immediately tossed her paper in the communal blue box. She wasn’t interested. But, she counted as a stat of someone receiving the paper.

Another personal example was when I was residing in a metropolitan area in the 1980s. The dailies had a subscription war. One of the papers phoned and offered me 12 weeks for $1 per week with no obligation to renew.

I took the offer, but found that due to my everyday busy lifestyle I was either tossing the paper or giving it away to my retired neighbour across the street.

I simply didn’t have time to read it even though the quality was certainly good.

After 12 weeks, I received a follow-up call asking if I wanted to renew the paper at the price of $6.95 per week.

No thanks. Had the price been $1 per week or, better still, free, I would have kept the delivery.

With The Daily Courier and The Penticton Herald, when someone buys our paper, or better still pays for a subscription, chances are they’re looking at it every day and reading every page. How many people read the freebie weeklies? Some do, but I doubt even their employees know.

I left my job as editor in Alberta which I absolutely loved because I wanted the chance to truly test my abilities.

I was now managing a paid daily. There’s absolutely no pressure to produce a quality product when you’re giving it away for free.

I face that challenge daily. If the product is weak, people won’t buy it.

I’ve also found that those willing to pay for a daily newspaper (either print or online subscriptions) are consumers, not afraid to spend money.

The freebies do have their place in the market. It’s a wonderful public service for those who can’t afford to subscribe or who simply don’t have the time to read a paper.

Our free products, Courier and Herald Extra, are an abridged version of the week’s top stories and goes to the homes of those who don’t subscribe to the full product. It’s an avenue for our flyer customers and others who want to enhance their advertising package.

I feel our ownership group offers the best of both worlds — a paid paper with guaranteed readership as well as a freebie product (which is especially popular in the rural areas.)

James Miller is valley editor for Okanagan Newspaper Group. This is a revised version of a column which originally ran Feb. 22, 2016 in The Penticton Herald.