3397.—Prices of Periodicals
By Editor
A correspondent in North Dakota asks why the prices of our papers should be higher when what farmers dispose of sells for less, while what they buy is higher. A farmers' paper is referred to which is but 25 cents a year; other farm papers, 50 cents a year. Why should our religious papers be so much more? The letter of five pages from which these queries are gleaned opens up great political questions which the statesmen and politicians and experts have been wrestling with for years. If farmers get less for their produce, the consumers pay more. During the last ten years the prices of the leading commodities of every-day life—food, clothing, building-material—have advanced from twenty-five to fifty per cent. If the farmers fail to get more, it is not the fault of the consumer, but of the selling system, partly the many middlemen. Regarding papers and their subscription prices, there has been constant advance for years in the prices of practically everything which enters into the cost of journals and magazines. Many religious papers with limited circulation are published at a loss. The farm papers of which our correspondent speaks are printed on cheap paper, and carry many advertisements. They could not be published at all on their subscription price. It is the advertisements that pay. If we should advertise as they do, we would meet objections from everywhere. Therefore the SIGNS OF THE TIMES, with a medium circulation, must charge a price to meet the cost. Many religious papers carrying more advertisements than we do and less reading-matter, have a higher subscription price. Most of the advertisements that other papers carry, our subscribers object to; therefore we must have a higher subscription price to cover cost. If our friends would give us a circulation of from 100,000 to 500,000, we could furnish the paper much cheaper. Large circulation, many advertisements, a cheap grade of paper, little reading-matter, poor print, mean less cost; limited circulation, few or no advertisements, a good grade of paper, good variety of the best of reading, good print, mean more cost.