MR subscription

i certainly agree larry, and i subscribed not long ago. i will not be renewing come december.

the final blow for me was a few weeks ago when i picked up 12 old mr and mrc issues at a little shop for a quarter each. wow - those mrs are great, and they're about three times the thickness of current ones. they are full of interesting articles, as opposed to the volumes of ads we get now.

the mrc issues look good too, i think i'll try them next year instead.

calvin.

Larry Blanchard wrote:

Good for you Larry;

I did not renew my sub to MR either and for the very same reason. With all the advertising that is in each issue, one would think that kalmbach could give the magazines away and still make money!

In the renewal notices that I receive, there is also included a red paper stating something to the effect of "Don't buy this magazine from any third party vendors. We will not honor their cheap subscription rates!" Seems as though Kalmbach is experiencing some financial dificulties the way that they are after our money.

By the way, it is not just MR, it is all the rags put out by Kalmbach that include that red paper and have such high sub rates.

I like MR but I will not sub to it any more until the rates come down a bit. $26.95 a year, maybe. Not 40 bux a year though. I will just buy off the shelf once in a while if there is an article that I just can't live without.

MRC is a nice mag. In fact I just bought the latest issue a week ago. I may sub to it. We'll see.

Have a good one,

Dan Harriman Orange, Texas

Larry Blanchard wrote in news:2h24ncF7uqhrU1 @uni-berlin.de:

That's the first time I'd seen that price - maybe they are having some problems. Seems I'd heard that all magazines are losing subscribers, there's just too much competition from online sources.

And if you like to build things, the even older MRs from the 60s were not as thick as the current ones, but had a lot more do-it- yourself stuff. Structures, scenery, electronics, cars, locos, whatever.

Well, , , Every company is doing the same thing. DishTV, Verizon telephone, and almost every service company, including most magazines that I know of. My membership in the ARRL (Amateur Radio) is the same also,I noticed the same thing, and resented it until it dawned on me that this is the "new generation" asserting themselves, and making $$$$ instead of careing about their subscribers.

Get used to it!!

R>Below is an email I just sent to MR. Since I suspect its

On Thu, 20 May 2004 16:49:48 UTC, Larry Blanchard wrote: 2000

I let my MR subscription lapse in April after more than 40 years. I noticed that I was going through MR more and more quickly the last few years. Not enough to keep me interested.

Nicely said, Larry. I too let my sub expire back in February, partly because of cost vs. value, partly because I'm in a unique situation. The model RR club I belong to has a complete collection of MR, from Vol. 1 No.1 to the present, and maintains a subscription to keep the collection complete. And it just happens that said collection is stored at my place, so there was no point in getting 2 copies every month. I read the club's copy, then put it on the shelf with the rest of them. Nonetheless, I'd decided several months before my sub expired not to renew. I pick up a couple of other mags (RMC and RailModel Journal) at a local HS regularly, and get more out of either of them that I've gotten out of MR the last few years.

Matt

Best solution - a club of 100 members could pass it around and everyone be done with it in a week, based on reading time alone.

I'll probably pick up a copy at the local library now and then.

I've been gradually building an index of my collection (mid 1959 to mid 2004 = 45 years) and some interesting trends are developing. I'll report when I get through. I'm not indexing articles that were interesting to read, I'm indexing construction stuff for future projects. Mostly structures, but also cars, locomotives, electronics, and anything else that I might want to go back and build.

I should report that I got a very nice letter from Terry Thompson thanking me for my years as a subscriber and saying they were sorry to see me go. He said they don't do a lot of the low cost offers because they're essentially loss leaders.

He also said that advertising income doesn't come close to covering the magazine costs. That surprises me! I may write back on that.

I agree with you 100% on this matter, and I've noticed other magazines use this same tactic. Apartment buildings do this too. Instead of leaving your rent the same or giving you a break starting with your

2nd year, many complexes raise your rent anywhere from a few dollars to a hundred or more a month, yet they offer new tenants the old cheaper rate, or in some cases reduced rates. You'd think they'd be more interested in preserving long-term tenants, but I honestly believe apartment buildings encourage people to constantly move in and out. I guess they must make money off people breaking their leases and such.

I've been an amateur photographer for most of my life. I use old manual focus 35mm film equipment and am happy with it, and don't plan to go autofocus or digital anytime soon. I used to read 4 different photo mags every month, but stopped subscribing years ago. Last fall when my 11 year old son was selling magazines for school, I decided to subscribe to Popular Photography after many years of not reading it. It was 9.97 for the subscription. I've been pleasantly surprised that the magazine has not gone totally digital, but I only planned on keeping it until the subscription ran out. I figured they'd go up to

20 or 30 dollars a year, or more.

Well, guess what...

1 year is STILL 9.97. In fact, if I want I can get 2 years for 14.97 or 3 years for 19.97.

At the 3 year rate, that'd only be 6.6566667 a year. Or to round it off, $6.66.

Yes, It's a kind of demonic price, but a HELL (pardon the pun) of a lot more affordable than 39.95 for Model Railroader renewals. I'm actually considering renewing for 3 years.

I personally have not subscribed to MR, nor bought shelf copies in years. I couldn't believe a single copy price was $4.95 when I looked through one a few days ago in a grocery store.

The magazine is simply not worth that much.

I do not subscribe to MR because the content is lacking. When a magazine has more advertising pages than content pages (I count the "New Products" section to be advertising), I say no thank you.

I get N-ScaleMagazine and The NArrow Gauge and Short Line Gazette. Both much better publications, more info and tips.

I think that of any modern magazine, any hobby Im in, 4wdin, trains, bikes, motorbikes, etc.

Refusing to return security deposits is a typicl scam - most of the victimes haven't the wherewithal to fight it.

6-12 weeks till it starts, mine just extended the current subscription after the last issue. Paid $14.95 with $5.00 paypal discount voucher...

Steve

after

Great price! Thanks for the tip.

I had that happen to me. I moved from AMLI in Gainesville, GA to another apartment complex in Marietta, GA. I'd lived at AMLI for 2 years. Occassionally my work (which incidentally I am a conductor/brakeman for Norfolk Southern) takes me back to Gainesville. I have checked with them several times via mail, phone and in person and the last time I went up there, and after they'd changed management personel, I was told they had no record of me living there. Ironically, when I once visited the AMLI apartments at Town Center (off Barrett Parkway), and mentioned being a former AMLI tenant, they were falling all over me to rent from them, even to the point of waiving the security fee. After awhile I stopped looking for an apartment and bought a house.

The AMLI at Gainesville had told me earlier that they were checking into why I hadn't received my deposit refund, then all of a sudden they had no record of me living there. It was only 100 dollars, but still, that's a good bit.

As a side note...the complex I lived in at Marietta returned my deposit in full about a month or so after I moved out. AMLI in Gainesville has never contacted me again.

Steve,

Thanks for the link and PLEASE let us know how this works out for you. With all the warnings issued by Kalmbach I would sure be pleased to find a lower cost source.

I noticed that they also carry Railroad Model Craftsman but not Model Railroading or Mainline Modeler.

Thanks again,

That's interesting because I receive several magazines free that are fully supported by advertising. These are subscriptions from my days in the computer industry that I still keep going. Now I'll admit that the advertisers in these magazines, such as Microsoft, Cisco, IBM, etc., probably are paying a lot more for ad space in these magazines than Walthers, Athearn, and Overland, etc., are paying for ad space in the hobby magazines. Therein probably lies the difference.