30% price increase of MR justified?

[Anonymous]

To the guys who don't subscribe and don't buy the magazine, but instead read it in the library: What a great idea! If everyone did that there wouldn't be ANY model magazines. And by the way, who do you think pays for this website and set up these forums?

As to the number of ads: Sure, there are a lot. But you know what? I enjoy reading them, which is way different than the other magazines I read where I hardly glance at the advertisements.

Someone else said that we have an expensive hobby, and that can certainly be true. But again, the hobby shop owners I know don't seem to be getting rich. And I also have the impression that the people who work for MR, RMC, and the other model magazines could make a lot more money doing a similar job in Time, or Newsweek, or any of the other glossy expensive magazines you see in your local book store. And while you're at it, next time you're in a book store check out the prices of some of the other magazines. They're not cheap.

[RhB_HJ]

QUOTE: Originally posted by DonCameron

To the guys who don't subscribe and don't buy the magazine, but instead read it in the library: What a great idea! If everyone did that there wouldn't be ANY model magazines. And by the way, who do you think pays for this website and set up these forums?
..............SNIP

Don, [;)]

Tell you what, I'm worse than that. [}:)][}:)] I actually look at the mag at our discount store, decide if it's worthwhile for my wife to bring it home from the library for me to read.

And as for the website and forums........ they are paid for out of general revenue at Kalmbach Publishing (I would think), any way you look at it it's very good advertising for the Kalmbach mags and all those ads by Google in the sidebar bring in revenue to off set expenses, as do all those fine things listed under "Shopping" in the nav bar.

BTW some of us still subscribe to model railway mags; we have just become much more selective as to which print products we spend money on. How one rationalizes that is a matter of priorities.
I subscribe to a mag out of Switzerland which offers a very nice mix of proto and model. Being as I model Swiss proto that's more important to me. I believe on this continent we call that getting the most bang for the buck, eh!?

[Anonymous]

QUOTE: Originally posted by RhB_HJ
......So don't give me the super-generosity bit, I know how the game works!...

HJ : Yes, you sure do know how the game works...you know how to get a free advertising plug for your business and website, on someone else's forum , that does not have a provision for buy-sell posts.
I guess the Game works really well on a holiday.
BTW, stop pretending our Canadian currency has any significance whatsoever in international transactions of any amount whatsoever....it hasn't....and to pretend it has, is just more whining.
Welcome to 2004,
Mike.

[RhB_HJ]

QUOTE: Originally posted by robmik
HJ : Yes, you sure do know how the game works...you know how to get a free advertising plug for your business and website, on someone else's forum , that does not have a provision for buy-sell posts.
I guess the Game works really well on a holiday.
BTW, stop pretending our Canadian currency has any significance whatsoever in international transactions of any amount whatsoever....it hasn't....and to pretend it has, is just more whining.
Welcome to 2004,
Mike.

Mike,

Yes Sir, I know how the game works, if you have a problem with that you can always send me an email.

As for the currency, going by your comment I would guess that you have never been in the business of exporting and importing. I guess when you talk to your friendly hobbyshop owner and he complains about those conditions he is just one more of the "whiners", eh!?

[Anonymous]

QUOTE: Originally posted by RhB_HJ
Mike,
As for the currency, going by your comment I would guess that you have never been in the business of exporting and importing. I guess when you talk to your friendly hobbyshop owner and he complains about those conditions he is just one more of the "whiners", eh!?

Your guess is not very good. Actually, I recently retired after 37 years with a Canadian manufacturer of mining equipment, the last 25 years as manager. ( You know, there are ALWAYS people around who know things, including some on this forum.)
Anyway, our sales reached a modest USD$30 million by 1999...with, 85% of these sales to export markets, on six continents, and every nickel of our export sales was in $USD.
Our labor & overhead costs were naturally in CDN$. About 50% of our material costs were offshore, mainly in Yen. The other 50% material costs were split fairly evenly between USA and Canadian.
About half the major Canadian suppliers required payment in US Dollars by 1999.
A trend hard to ignore.
BTW, our selling prices were, and are, driven 100% by the competition, not by any other issues.How to make a buck on those sales, regardless of outside factors, was why they employed people like me.

It was, and is, extremely difficult to juggle ever-changing exchange factors in any business....but to pretend the Canadian dollar is anything at all doesn't help. Perhaps it's not whining...perhaps it's just naive. The US dollar, the Euro, and the Yen are the current valuation currencies for goods & services...the Remnibi will soon be a factor.
On the world stage, the Canadian dollar will never be anything but an annoyance, and an excuse for the banks to rip us off for a point or two every time we have to effect a currency change.

BUT...I hope you have success in business in 2004, and beyond.
I wish you were busier today, in fact.[;)]
Mike[:D]
Oh yes...my 'local retailers' of all products, never seem to whine about export-import or US Dollar factors, just their own occupancy costs, the fact that people aren't spending money, but most of all...their TAXES.[V]

[rventura]

(Start of rant)

Hells Bells! What a lot of whining. It only went up for one issue, then back to normal. If you want to avoid such pricing blips, subscribe!. Oh, but I forgot: according to so many of the posts there's only about ten pages of articles and the rest is ads. Or repeats of layouts you've seen before etc. etc. If MR is so bad, go read some of the others around and stop filling the forums with ridiculaous gripes. You know most of you are exagerrating. Sure there are a lot of ads, buts ALL magazines have a lot of ads. That's part of the price of admission. Or would you rather pay $10-15 per issue?

Just be grateful that there's a great mag like MR available to the hobby.

(End of Rant)

Keep it up, all you folks at MR. You do a great job. I'm not a fan of some of the cosmetic changes recently, and moving things around, but at least all the content I love is there, so I'll get used to the changes.

Ron Ventura