Had a letter advising the cost was going up to around £67 per year. Might not sound a lot but a new subscriber pays £44 per year! And gets a free Monty Don book.
It's the same as insurance policies - new people get the bonuses. Now that that's been sorted out, maybe the same will happen with magazines. Especially if people just stop buying.
The trouble is that although this sounds like a grand idea, in actual fact everyone just ends up paying the full amount and nobody gets the initial bonus. 🥺
Well - yes @Lancashire Lass, in the same way that girls used to get a better deal on car insurance because boys were more likely to cause accidents etc, and when they decided to 'level that up' they just made girls pay the same as boys
Loyalty to any organisation shouldn't be penalised, which is what the root problem is.
It's a place where beautiful isn't enough of a word....
I live in west central Scotland - not where that photo is...
I couldn't agree more. As I have said earlier in this thread, anyone can get all of these magazines totally free from their local library in digital format so that seems to me to be the best solution. The only way that the subscription will come down is if a lot of subscribers cancel.
I've subscibed to GW magazine for years. They recently wrote to me to ask if I would like to renew my annual May subscription for £19.99 for 6 months, renewable every 6 months for £19.99. I think that is cheaper than I paid before.
I read GW and The Garden from cover to cover. Before Covid we used to visit gardens with the 2 for 1 ticket quite a lot.
I don't want the seeds though, I prefer to choose my own, though I may use some of them. OH's garden in Norfolk is pretty full and, since Brexit, I can't take them back to France to my garden, which would love them.
I have been gardening for nearly 50 years.
Dordogne and Norfolk. Clay in Dordogne, sandy in Norfolk.
Had a letter advising the cost was going up to around £67 per year. Might not sound a lot but a new subscriber pays £44 per year! And gets a free Monty Don book.
It's the same as insurance policies - new people get the bonuses. Now that that's been sorted out, maybe the same will happen with magazines. Especially if people just stop buying.
Yes it is very annoying though. Cancelled one day, got an email from them the next offering me a deal to renew. Probably won't bother though, greedy gits shouldn't have just upped the cost by so much if they wanted to keep my custom.
It seems to me that GW now has more for novice gardeners than for those with some experience. I have subscribed since the very first issue decades ago but do not get much from it these days. Even the plant offers are not as good as they once were. I still read the magazine but there is a great deal of basic stuff for beginners and repeats of seasonal advice. I am still subscribing because I pass every issue on to my daughter but otherwise would have cancelled long before now and if the cost increases may do so now.
I subscribe to "Gardens Illustrated", which costs me a little more than it does for UK subscribers, having it shipped to France. I have a good laugh at the "posh" gardening articles, like @Bee witched . But on the whole I find it quite valuable, for its in-depth articles about plants, etc. The only pages I do not read are those devoted to vegs, but that's only a double page per issue. I admit to experience a little bit of satisfaction when some plants I have in my own modest garden are listed in some articles such as 100 must-have plants, etc.
Something strange re subscription costs happened recently, maybe because of the Brexit (or the Covid?). If I renew online, which is quite convenient, then I have to pay something like £20 more than if I send my bank card details by post!
I cancelled mine after it almost doubled, they offered me various deals but honestly I was so annoyed that they were trying to charge me more per issue than it would cost me to buy it in the shops every month and I cancelled anyway. I’d found I was reading it as much anyway!
Posts
Loyalty to any organisation shouldn't be penalised, which is what the root problem is.
I live in west central Scotland - not where that photo is...
I live in west central Scotland - not where that photo is...
I read GW and The Garden from cover to cover. Before Covid we used to visit gardens with the 2 for 1 ticket quite a lot.
I don't want the seeds though, I prefer to choose my own, though I may use some of them. OH's garden in Norfolk is pretty full and, since Brexit, I can't take them back to France to my garden, which would love them.
I have been gardening for nearly 50 years.