• This topic has 23 replies, 14 voices, and was last updated 11 years ago by grum.
Viewing 24 posts - 1 through 24 (of 24 total)
  • Subscription price increase.
  • Conan257
    Free Member

    So my digital subscription has gone from £15 to £20, a 33% increase!

    I understand costs go up, and that’s to be expected (even though I’ve not had a payrise in 4 years and the next 2 years will give a max 1% pay increase). But a 1/3 increase seems ridiculous.

    The magazine price is £4.50 I believe, so can the cost of this be expect to rise to £6? I doubt it, which makes me assume that the extra cost of my digital subscription is paying for other people to read a hard copy…

    Add on my lack of free book/t-shirt deal etc recently, i’m starting to get a little peeved…

    jambalaya
    Free Member

    You should see the £15 as an introductory discount. £20 is still good value no ?

    I very much doubt the digital subscribers are subsidising the paper magazine, also you are quoting the single issue price not subscription.

    bigblackshed
    Full Member

    Single issue cover price is £5.95.

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    Mark
    Full Member

    The mag costs £5.95 in the newsagents.
    The price increase is extremely necessary unfortunately. Digital subscriptions are not as profitable or cheap to produce as at first it may appear. For a start to produce as much digital content across as many different platforms as are popping up on a regular basis we’ve invested in a second designer, which is an expensive investment but one that is needed.
    Plus VAT is charged on digital subs at 20% so that £15 translated to £12.50 (before costs). And that’s not a lot of money for a sub that gets you not just everything premier on the website for a year but also everything we’ve ever published in our entire 11 year history.

    There’s 77 back issues and by the time a current digital sub bought today expires that will have offered up 85 issues of Singletrack. That works out at 23p per issue + all the extra Premier features.

    Also, I should explain that the standard price of a digital sub will be £25 from the 1st December. All existing subscribers renewal rates will be held at the current £20 rate for at least a year after that though. In other words, the increase to £25 for a digital sub will only apply to new subscribers who start a subscription after the 1st December.

    The price of a Print&Digital sub will be going up to £39.99 on the 1st December too. But only for new subscriptions started after that date. If you are an existing subscriber then your next renewal will be held at the current standard £35 rate.

    Print subscribers get all the same benefits of the digital subscribers plus the printed mag posted 8 times a year. Considering that £8 of that cost is purely for post and packing I hope that you can see that our subs are incredibly good value for money and as we have always done, we price our subs according to what they cost us plus what we absolutely need in order to keep going and sustain Singletrack.

    Conan257
    Free Member

    Mark,

    That should have been the content of the email I received 😛

    Bit happier now, thanks.

    grum
    Free Member

    If it makes you feel any better, new subscribers don’t really get the t-shirts etc they are promised when they sign up, so you’re not losing out on that front as an existing customer. 😛

    druidh
    Free Member

    Mark – genuine question….

    The difference between Digital and Print & Digital will be £15. Does that cover the cost of printing and distribution?

    miketually
    Free Member

    The difference between Digital and Print & Digital will be £15. Does that cover the cost of printing and distribution?

    If £8 is postage, I doubt that they can print for £7 per 8 issues. Must make more on a digital-only sub than on a print + digital?

    gavtheoldskater
    Free Member

    can i add my 2p, mods feel free to delete this post if you want…

    i get a bit annoyed with supermarkets and the buy one get two free type deals. why not just do one item for less?

    so with the mag, there was an offer the other week, can’t remember if i was emailed it or saw it on the site, it was a subscription plus i got the online, a t-shirt and a second year for about 20quid.

    well, i don’t need a Tshirt. i can’t stand reading mags on line, i’ll subscribe annually if the content stays good, and i would subscribe if the price was right.

    surfer, for instance, is 4.95 a copy in the UK. i had’nt bought it for years. last year i was offered a subscription that worked out to 2.50 a copy, when i actually subscribed they them offered me another year for something stupid like a tenner so for 2 years, or 24 issues, i’m paying about 2.20 each… thats for a mag from the US.

    i’m not saying charge that low, surfer is owned by a huge company and obviously subs are a loss leader to get numbers up for ad sales. but you guys know what it costs to produce and mail a mag, and maybe a barebones deal on just the paper mag may sway a few folk like me.

    grum
    Free Member

    so with the mag, there was an offer the other week, can’t remember if i was emailed it or saw it on the site, it was a subscription plus i got the online, a t-shirt and a second year for about 20quid.

    well, i don’t need a Tshirt.

    It’s ok, you don’t really get the t-shirt – it’s just bait to get you to subscribe. 🙂

    miketually
    Free Member

    i get a bit annoyed with supermarkets and the buy one get two free type deals. why not just do one item for less?

    Supermarkets do it because it works. Their customers spend more than they would otherwise spend.

    Mark
    Full Member

    Grum,

    Have you emailed anyone about your missing t-shirt? If not then that’s how we will be able to sort the issue out for you. If you have and it’s still not arrived then email me direct and I’ll deal with it for you. In fact.. just email me your address and I’ll go downstairs and pack it up for you and make sure it’s in the post. Let me know what size you want.

    The best way I can explain how the free t-shirt(or any gift) thing works is by pointing people at my last blog entry on subs deals. If you read that it should explain why we couldn’t really reduce the cost of a sub by much at all by not including the t-shirt or other free gift.

    hora
    Free Member

    I was in 18bikes yesterday and noticed that Privateer mag is NINE QUID?!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

    Mark
    Full Member

    Hi Grum,
    Looking into it at our end it seems you subscribed 25 minutes after the tee & Tenner deal ended on the 1st October. That would be why you haven’t had the t-shirt as your account details were not imported into the deal.

    However, we’ve just added your £10 credit to your account and if you let subs@singletrackworld.com know your t-shirt size we’ll send one out to you.

    flyingmonkeycorps
    Full Member

    I got a T-Shirt a few weeks after I did my subscription. It’s quite nice, lovely shade of red.

    patriotpro
    Free Member

    FWIW it’s worth I received my t-shirt fine and in good time.

    funkrodent
    Full Member

    Until recently I spent 15 years in the publishing game. Originally magazines, then magazines + (really crappy) website, then for the final three years, online only. What I can add is this. 15 years ago – assuming the publisher got it right – publishing was almost a licence to print money. Then t’internet came along and changed everything, in particular hammered ad sales as manufacturers now had a direct route to market. Then the recession kicked in and lots of publishers were caught (me included) in a perfect storm of reduced ad budgets and new digital options for advertisers. Lots of companies went to the wall. For three years through this I kept a digital-only publisher alive and even made it profitable enough to get out 12 months ago with a few quid in my back pocket, but it was hard work and we were lucky enough (I won’t pretend to have been particularly blessed with foresight) to have a niche product that just about worked in the digital sphere. Suffice to say that I’m now in a very different industry. I can’t stress enough how much I am in awe of what the guys at Singletrack have done and continue to do.The quality of their product (online and offline) is absolutely superb (design, editorial, website etc) and I for one know that when I add up everything I get over a full year for £40 (or £3.30 a month!, or 83p per week!!)I get incredible value for money from them.
    *personal gripe time* The internet generation seem to think that everything should be close to free at the point of purchase, but are often the first to kick off when something is deemed to be sub-standard. Given the amount of time and effort involved to produce the magazine and site on an ongoing basis, the cost of a 1/4 pint of beer per week is one of the best deals that most of us will ever see. Rant over.

    grum
    Free Member

    Grum,

    Have you emailed anyone about your missing t-shirt? If not then that’s how we will be able to sort the issue out for you. If you have and it’s still not arrived then email me direct and I’ll deal with it for you. In fact.. just email me your address and I’ll go downstairs and pack it up for you and make sure it’s in the post. Let me know what size you want.

    I did yeah – sent an email to the address someone gave me on another thread but never heard back.

    Looking into it at our end it seems you subscribed 25 minutes after the tee & Tenner deal ended on the 1st October. That would be why you haven’t had the t-shirt as your account details were not imported into the deal.

    Pretty sure I did it within the time limit – not sure why it would be showing up as 25 minutes later.

    However, we’ve just added your £10 credit to your account and if you let subs@singletrackworld.com know your t-shirt size we’ll send one out to you.

    Yay! Thank you. 🙂

    Mark
    Full Member

    No problem, and apologies for your email not being responded to.

    tracknicko
    Free Member

    Given the amount of time and effort involved to produce the magazine and site on an ongoing basis, the cost of a 1/4 pint of beer per week is one of the best deals that most of us will ever see.

    i fear we are all possibly missing a major point.

    if a magazine needs to charge £9 an issue then they need to walk down to their advertising dept and kick some arses.

    the meeeeja distribution model in its ideal format would almost allow free subscriptions (to boost circulation numbers), as advertising is (or should be) the main income generator.

    this is how it has worked for newspapers for generations… seems much more logical than pushing towards £10 an issue!

    grum
    Free Member

    No problem, and apologies for your email not being responded to.

    Warm fuzzy feeling restored.

    I guessed the email must have ended up in a spam filter somewhere, and I was too lazy to chase it up using a telephone, so I thought I’d just post sarky comments about it on here instead. 🙂

    patricksingletrack
    Free Member

    If anyone ever needs to get in touch with us, there is no big secret. All contact details are here http://singletrackworld.com/contact-us/ and that link can always be found in the footer of every page of the site. If for any reason your email gets missed or mis-filed and you don’t get a response, email again and complain.

    We work hard to try to get back to everyone in good time with sensible responses.

    funkrodent
    Full Member

    @ Tracknicko

    if a magazine needs to charge £9 an issue then they need to walk down to their advertising dept and kick some arses.

    the meeeeja distribution model in its ideal format would almost allow free subscriptions (to boost circulation numbers), as advertising is (or should be) the main income generator.

    this is how it has worked for newspapers for generations… seems much more logical than pushing towards £10 an issue!

    So much to say, so little time 🙂

    Where to begin. Its not as simple as “sell more ads dunderheads”. A combination of the rise of digital and the extended downturn means that smaller budgets are now spread much more thinly. It is hard for magazines to get even half of the page rate that they could get even 5 years ago, let alone 10. Add to that the fact that they now have to sustain big complex websites (like this one) and that print and distribution costs have increased and you have circumstances that create (in some cases terminal) challenges for publishers.
    With regard to your point about free subscriptions, it doesn’t necessarily work like that. I’m willing to bet that Rouleur magazine sell advertising on the basis that their readers pay £9 an issue
    The rationale being that readers who are prepared to cough up that kind of dosh are far more loyal, possibly with more disposal income and therefore more likely to buy whatever the advertiser has to sell, particularly given that high-end bikes are a fairly niche market. Mass free circulation is only really relevant if you’re flogging things like mobile phones or insurance.
    Finally, the example of newspapers? With all due respect I presume that you’re being deliberately ironic? All the big newspapers have been losing circulation, haemorrhaging money and sacking staff like there’s no tomorrow. That applies to the broadsheets, the tabloids and the regionals. Why? Because the internet has taken readership, advertising has either gone online (cars, houses, jobs), or disappeared due to lack of budget and despite the fact that they have enormously su cessful websites, it is virtually impossible to make money out of t’internet.
    The only publishers who are doing ok are niche ones (like Singletrack) who talk to a very loyal and clearly defined audience and can sell their exclusivity to the type of organisation who want to talk to those readers.
    Good luck to the guys at Singletrack and the way you handled the T-shirt issue was class by the way

    grum
    Free Member

    Got my t-shirt, many thanks. 🙂

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