A few years ago our newspaper delivery vendor stopped carrying about 2/3 of
the newspapers we had been receiving through them.  These papers from the
mainland and from the Pacific Rim were much utilized by our patrons, and
suddenly our only option was direct subscriptions, with mail delivery.  Not
only did the cost go up, but papers we had previously received a day or two
behind publication are now coming in a month or more behind, when they come
in at all.  With one newspaper we went almost 6 weeks without receiving an
issue, although the paper swore they were sending them out daily.  I can
only assume the papers are sent over by leaky boats, and some crew member
keeps grabbing our papers to use to slow the leaks.

With the costs, and the delays in delivery (with some papers, we don't
anticipate delivery of the paper until after the claim date, which is
another problem) I have given serious consideration towards dropping all but
the four major papers.  But, we have a significant number of people who come
here looking for regional papers because they are considering permanent
moves from Hawaii, and we are the only source locally for those papers.
With the next budget reduction, I probably will have to let them go.

Charles L. King
Serials Librarian
Hawaii State Library
478 South King Street
Honolulu, HI 96813-2994
http://www.hawaii.gov/libraries/hsl/serials.html

-----Original Message-----
From: SERIALST: Serials in Libraries Discussion Forum
[mailto:SERIALST@list.uvm.edu] On Behalf Of Holman Jenifer S
Sent: Monday, April 21, 2008 4:13 AM
To: SERIALST@LIST.UVM.EDU
Subject: [SERIALST] Daily Newspapers

We just received word that many of our newspapers delivered daily are no
longer available.  The delivery service says that the major newspaper
companies can no longer afford to transport papers to smaller markets. Our
only option will be to subscribe to newspapers via mail delivery, meaning
that our users who like to come in first thing in the morning and read the
New York Times or the Chicago Tribune will no longer be able to do so.

I wonder if other libraries are experiencing similar problems with newspaper
delivery?  Will you continue with mail delivery?  Or are you canceling print
newspapers and relying on the online versions?

Jen Holman

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Jenifer Holman
Acquisitions Librarian
Murphy Library
University of Wisconsin-La Crosse
1631 Pine St.
La Crosse, WI 54601

phone: 608-785-8395
fax: 608-785-8639
email: holman.jeni@uwlax.edu http://www.uwlax.edu/murphylibrary/
<http://www.uwlax.edu/murphylibrary/>