La Porte Biz Blog

As some of you may know, I worked for the local newspaper for almost 4 years. I was “downsized” along with over 30 others at the end of October. The reasoning was due to cost cutting measures. Which looking at the state of newspapers, I do understand. Yet, I have don't understand the logic behind cutting cost at the expense of your subscribers and your business clients.

I decided to take a survey of 100 residences and 30 businesses in La Porte. The results are somewhat surprising, but not unexpected from the comments I received.

Of the 100 residences, 32 subscribed to the paper. 12 of the 68 non-subscribers had canceled or did not renew the paper in the last 6 months. This is a loss of over 24% in 6 months! Of the 32 subscribers 7 of them plan on not renewing the paper, when it comes time to renew. That is a loss of just over 21%. Which means that in a one year period, the paper could lose 38% of it's subscribes.

Of the 30 local businesses, 16 subscribe to the paper and 14 do not. Of the 14 that do not receive the paper, 4 of them canceled the paper in the last 6 months, a 20% loss.. Of the 16 subscribers, 3 (18.75%) do not plan on renewing the paper. Which could me a loss of 35% in a years time of business subscribers. Now some of the businesses do receive the paper at home also, and they are undecided on if they plan on renewing the paper for home use.

The reasons I received on why they do not get or why they dropped the paper, ranged from mild to harsh. One of the main reason was the paper has taken a step back in look and coverage. I was even told that there is more local news in the sister paper for Michigan City. The new format was a sticking point with the majority of people. They felt it was smaller, harder to read, and they didn't like the multiple sections.

When asked about the paper's website, 35% of the people surveyed did say they visited it in the last month. The comments on that where just as negative. Too bland, no good content, cannot access all of the classifieds, and it isn't updated over the weekends.

The results of the survey and the comments make you question the commitment of the local paper to serving the community and the local businesses. With the state of the local economy, local businesses need to demand that their advertising gets results!

Do you have any comments, questions or suggestions on this subject? E-mail them to me and we can address them in a future issue.

Have a GREAT Week!