Economic Pressures Refine the Operation

The Milton Times, like most businesses in the region this year, is faced with a cash flow issue. Figures from the first quarter of 2009 just don’t match 2008.

The simple solution is to cut expenses. The riskier solution is to use credit to fill the gap. But one real alternative is to concentrate on new revenue.

This week the circulation manager, Judy McDonough, and I talked about our subscriber base and ways we can lean on that base to increase the company’s cash flow. At the beginning of the year, we created a slight increase in the price of  an in-town subscription. Despite that increase, the circulation revenue has remained flat.

Our in-town subscription is a great deal. Not only does the post office handle weekly delivery but in-town subscribers save more than 30% over the newsstand price.  

Our hope is that we don’t have to do anything that will diminish our product. So this week we are going through our subscriber list to see whether there might be people who have been receiving the paper as part of a past promotion. We need to be sure we are covering our costs. These changes are a good thing.

Cutting waste is always a positive step.

This entry was posted on 14. April 2009 at 14:19 and is filed under behind the news. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response or trackback from your own site.

| Print