Is the Joplin Globe worth $428.87 a year?

 

It doesn't seem like that long ago, I ripped the Joplin Globe for increasing its subscription prices to more than $200 a year.

In the time since I wrote that post, the Globe's managing editor, who lived in Kansas City anyway, left the newspaper, as did a number of other editors, including Joe Hadsall and Kevin McClintock.

The Globe appears to be down to three hard news reporters- Debby Woodin, Jeff Lehr and John Hacker.

Over the past few years, the Globe's coverage area has continued to shrink. It's essentially Joplin, Webb City, Carl Junction and Carthage, with sprinklings of news from other Jasper County towns and adjacent counties.

At the time I wrote the previous post, the Globe was published seven days a week, print and e-paper. That is no longer the case. The Globe has eliminated its Sunday and Monday editions and there are times when it might as well have chopped off another weekday or two.

Rumors continue to circulate that the Globe's classified advertising section has been declared an endangered species.

Only a small percentage of the deaths in this community are recorded in the Globe these days because the cost is too much for grieving families. The same mindset that decided obituaries were no longer news but a cash cow, has also drastically curtailed the number of wedding, engagement and anniversary announcements. In other words, your news is no longer important, but we will happily take your money.

With every one of the Globe's changes decreasing the amount of local news that is carried in its pages, the powers that be at the area's "newspaper of record" have still seen fit to double the price of subscriptions.

You have to sympathize with the people who make the decisions at the Globe, wherever they are. Paper and supplies cost more and how in the world are you going to replace the money that used to come from all of the newspaper's fleeing subscribers unless you jack up the prices for the loyal subscribers who remain.

This is not just a Joplin Globe problem. It is a basic problem that has infected the entire newspaper industry. Out-of-town owners with no feel for the community cut jobs, reduce frequency of publication and eliminate jobs.

They also push deadlines earlier and earlier meaning that important news from local meetings is often stale by the time it is published. You would think that problem might be lessened by publishing the stories on the website, but for some reason, in this day and age when immediacy has become more prized than ever in news coverage, no one at the Globe seems to be in any rush.

It would not surprise me if the next step will be for the Globe to follow the example of so many other chain-owned newspapers and sell its building and move to some storefront to save money.

Let me make one thing clear- I am a Joplin Globe subscriber and will continue to subscribe. I don't subscribe to the print edition; I have a digital subscription. I read the e-edition every morning, sometimes to see stories I did not have on the Turner Report and more often than you would think to see how many days (or weeks) it takes for the Globe to cover something that was featured on this blog.

I also read the comics, letters to the editor, Wally Kennedy's column and the page one stories (most of the time). I check out the Saturday opinion page every week to see if the Globe's editors will ever come to their senses and stop publishing Geoff Caldwell's column.

The Globe has value and I might be willing to overlook the problems that have been caused by today's newspaper economics if the powers that be at the Globe would ever simply level with us, which is after all the job of a newspaper.

When the decision was made to eliminate the Sunday edition, we were told that surveys indicated more people wanted to receive all of the extra features that were in that edition on Saturday.

Show me the surveys and what questions were asked to reach that conclusion.

Why couldn't the Globe simply say it was eliminating the Sunday edition because it was getting rid of its carriers and only delivering the newspaper by mail?

There's no mail on Sunday, hence there's no way to put out a Sunday edition.

We may not have liked it, but we would have understood it.

Contrary to what Globe decision makers think, we can handle the truth.

The same type of thinking is on display in the letter the Globe sent to subscribers, which a subscriber to the print and digital editions was kind enough to give to me.

Thank you for being a Joplin Globe subscriber and supporting local journalism.

Your Total Access subscription continues to include at no additional charge the E-paper published five days a week available online at 5 a.m. as well as unlimited access to our Joplin Globe website and mobile apps.

The value of this service alone is $239.88 per year.

Besides the E-paper, on our website or in the mobile app's live news mode, you'll find individual news articles published online all throughout the day, including additional regional and national news that won't all fit in our print or E-paper editions. If you have not yet set up your Globe Total Access account online, please call our Subscriber Services Department at 417-782-2626 and we will help you set this up. You may also e-mail us at circ@joplinglobe.com for help.

This points out one of the biggest problems facing the Globe. The newspaper is doing its best to push its online edition and mobile app when many of its remaining subscribers only read the print edition. Worse, judging by the subscription information offered on the Globe website, they do not offer a print-only subscription (or they keep it well hidden or because it's online, maybe they don't feel it's necessary to mention a print-only option).

In other words, if you are an 80-year-old person who has been a loyal subscriber to the Joplin Globe for 60 years, you are not only paying for the print edition, but for Globe products you will never use.

At that point in the letter, the Globe finally get around to telling the subscriber what he or she already should have known was coming.

Starting March 1, the price for your Total Access subscription including Tuesday through Saturday by mail will be $32.99 per four weeks with your discount for Easy Pay automatic renewal. You don't need to do anything to keep on receiving the best rate in our Easy Pay program. You can continue to enjoy the best local news and sports coverage available.

Thank you for being a valued Joplin Globe Easy Pay customer, and we look forward to serving you for many years to come. If you have any questions, please feel free to contact us in Subscriber Services at 417-782-2626 Monday to Friday 8 a.m. to 4 p.m.

The letter is signed by Daniel Kuhns, Director of Circulation, The Joplin Globe

$32.99 every four weeks adds up to $428.87 a year.

$428.87 a year. You don't see that figure mentioned in Daniel Kuhns' letter. 

To readers who are on fixed income, that is a lot of money.

To readers who aren't on fixed income, that's a lot of money.

And nowhere does the letter include any mention of the reason or reasons why the subscription increase was necessary. Sure, we have a good idea, but it would have been nice if the Globe had been more transparent with its readers.

***

SUPPORT THE TURNER REPORT/INSIDE JOPLIN

The Turner Report/Inside Joplin is the only locally owned news operation in Joplin. 

The Turner Report features coverage of news, courts, crime and politics for this corner of southwest Missouri, as well as commentary.

Inside Joplin covers breaking news and the type of records page material that used to be in newspapers- marriage licenses, dissolutions, bankruptcies, as well as community news.

Inside Joplin Obituaries has featured more than 21,000 free obituaries in the past 10 years and carries more than three times the number of obituaries that are published in the Joplin Globe.

Inside the Ozarks- features news from the counties between this area and Springfield.

The Turner Report Newsletter, published Monday through Saturday nights, includes links to all posts from the blogs mentioned above, as well as the following:

-My daily column

-Links of interest to articles about Missouri and this area, the Cardinals, Chiefs and Royals, and state political coverage, plus daily Joplin Police Department incident and dispatch reports, a link to Carthage News Online, Associated Press's Today in History feature, and weekly roundups of world photographs from AP and political cartoons from Politico.

-Links to daily crosswords puzzles, comics and word games

-Links to videos from the Joplin, Springfield, St. Louis, Kansas City and Jefferson City television stations, as well as from other sources.

You can sign up for the newsletter by e-mailing me at rturner229@hotmail.com.

How much do you have to pay for a subscription to all of the above?

You decide.

You can contribute any amount big or small through the PayPal and Venmo links below, send your contribution to Randy Turner, 2306 E. 8th, Apt. A, Joplin, MO 64801 or you don't have to pay anything at all.

You decide.

If you don't have the money, spread the word about the blogs and the newsletter and please feel free to share the content with friends and family. That will be much appreciated.

This one-man news operation has continued to grow, thanks to your support.

The best is yet to come. Thanks!

https://venmo.com/rturner229