What do you get for your money, when you buy your weekly Sunday Times?
Pages 2 and 3: Two full page adverts for Rolex watches.
Page 8: Full page advert for Chaumet, Paris.
Page 10 Full page advert for P & O Cruises.
Page 14: Full page advert for Tesco.
Page 16; Full page advert for Facebook.
Page 26: Full page advert for 'The Times and Sunday Times'.
Page 40: Full back-page advert for Dior Sauvage.
Plus; 11 half page adverts for a variety of things; and various other quarter page ad's. The magazine's are at least 75% adverts, and the Sport and Travel and Home sections probably contain even more.
Still, Sunday wouldn't be Sunday without all that advertising all over the sitting room floor!
I love it.
That's how papers (and magazines) make money. Otherwise they wouldn't be viable.
ReplyDeleteI'll let you into a secret since I know you like to save money: If you are the proud owner of a Waitrose loyalty card (green) and you spend £10.00 plus per shopping trip you will get the broadsheet of your choice for free. Yes, really. Obviously, best value you are the big fat Saturdays and Sundays. Except I hate going to the shops on Sundays, even Waitrose.
It's actually rather interesting, AND most generous of them, that they do this. If economically illiterate you will think "gosh, the paper loses out, the shop loses (about £0.60/copy) and yet there is your freebee on a mere £10.00). And thus the circle closes - advertising being the name of the game. Say, you read all your papers on line most will have a paywall. However, and it's a biggie, the reader can block adverts on line. Now where does that leave advertisers? Exactly.
End of sermon. And it's not even Sunday (any longer).
U
Lady M does pop down to Waitrose occasionally for the 'Free' paper, but one has to wait until 11 am for the wretched shop to open; that's half a day's reading time.
DeleteOddly enough a friend of mine dashed out yesterday for the Times because they wanted the pull out for the 'Books of the Year.'
ReplyDeleteBut I wonder if you've ever seen the Sunday New York Times. It weighs a ton and takes days to get through. It's also full of advertising as well.
I've heard about it; the UK version is bad enough. It's mostly rubbish.
DeleteThe Sunday New York Times is amazing. In particular the wedding and engagement announcements, just seem so dated.
DeleteCro, if get a library card you will likely have access to PressReader - that will give you free access, on a device, to many newspapers and magazines. I enjoy reading newspapers from other countries. Stories that are not covered in UK papers. You could also keep up your French.
Yes, and it's all in English! I'd be reading everything including the small print in the ads.
ReplyDeleteWe used to get Greek Sunday papers but stopped with the economic crisis. I miss all the way inserts, cooking mags, holiday brochures, special offer pamphlets, even though they were in greek
We usually keep reading it until the following Sunday. There's plenty in there; once you get past all those ads.
DeleteAnd still you have to pay Murdoch for the newspaper.
ReplyDeleteI hear that the lovely Kylie Minogue is returning to live in Melbourne; will you be queueing outside her door for a 'selfie'?
DeleteErr, no but I quite like her.
DeleteOur daily ad-laden paper is called (not surprisingly) The Advertiser. The Sunday Mail, does have more stories, but then it also has a larger sport section, plus plenty of "liftouts", pages designed to be lifted from the centre of the paper and dedicated to Escape (travel ads) Wellbeing (health and fitness) Binge (the TV guide) and so on. At least the pages are colourful.
ReplyDeleteI was quite shocked yesterday to see how many full page ads there were. There was hardly room for any real news.
DeleteI don’t read them anymore
ReplyDeleteFrankly, John, there's not a lot in them to read; unless you enjoy reading words such as 'Rolex' or 'Tesco'.
DeleteI gave up buying a Sundary paper many years ago. Then during Covid lockdown 1 I gave up buying a daily paper too after I heard the journalists speaking at the Government Briefings. Now I only buy my daily local paper. The circulation figures of the national dailies and the Sundays is now incredibly low.
ReplyDeleteI don't know why we bother either. Any news we want comes from TV, and the Times' columnists are not what they were.
DeleteI only buy the Saturday edition of the Telegraph, mainly because I like their crossword. The rest is udually rubbish.
ReplyDeleteI used to like the Telegraph Crosswords. They were more 'achievable' than the Times.
DeleteI don't buy any papers at all. Waste of money, there's plenty of news on the radio and telly without having to sit down for hours to read it all. The only time I get to read them is when I go down to the local paper recycling to take out papers to use as bin liners!
ReplyDeleteIt's always handy to have a few sheets of newsprint in the house, they serve all sorts of uses.
DeleteAlso good for polishing one's shoes upon and for catching poop in a budgerigar's cage. With clever folds you can also make Christmas party hats, paper aeroplanes or paper "sticks" to start fires. "The Sunday Times" should advertise these benefits to boost sales.
ReplyDeleteThose uses are probably better than searching for 'news'.
DeleteI have the Times every day but Sunday - can't bear it then - such a lot of rubbish.
ReplyDeleteNothing but advertising!
DeleteNewspapers are not what they used to be. The ads must provide a good income stream for the newspapers. Soon there will be more ads than news print.
ReplyDeleteI think that was the case on Sunday; it seemed to be more noticeable than usual.
DeleteWe don't take any Sunday newspapers, I'd rather save a tree! I do, however, get the Telegraph every Saturday for the General Knowledge crossword.
ReplyDeleteThe target is to finish it before I go to bed on Saturday night, I usually achieve that!
I am aware that my brain is slowing down very slightly, so doing the crossword is a self test every week!
I used to send it in every week, but after years of winning absolutely nothing, I gave up!
I used to buy the Telegraph. It is where the alumni of my school post news of births weddings deaths, etc; and for the crossword of course.
Delete