51 years on, it’s end of the line for Yellow Pages
THE final edition of Yellow Pages will be published next year after more than half a century, hundreds of millions of copies and some of the most popular adverts.
The directory has been found next to landlines in homes since 1966.
Its phone numbers have solved many a crisis and secured lucrative business for countless traders.
And slogans such as “Let your fingers do the walking” have entered the nation’s consciousness. But the book has fallen victim to the ease and convenience of computer technology. Although still profitable for now, parent company Yell is calling time on it.
Businesses will in future use Yell’s websites and other digital platforms. Yell is printing 23 million copies of one last edition next year that it hopes will become a souvenir. Chief executive Richard Hanscott said: “After 51 years Yellow Pages is a household name and we’re proud to say we still have customers who’ve been with us from the very first one.”
Perhaps the best-loved advert, from 1983, shows a gentle old man – Norman Lumsden – trying to trace an out-of-print book, Fly Fishing by J R Hartley. After a fruitless search he looks in Yellow Pages and finds one – and we discover he is the author. Another shows a teenager waking to the chaos of his parents’ house after a party: “Hello, French polishers? It’s just possible you could save my life.”
The first UK phone book dates back to 1880 and contained just 248 names but no numbers. To get connected, the caller would call the operator.
The first UK Yellow Pages was launched in Brighton. Seven years later they were provided nationwide.