Clarion Ledger = Fail

JACKSON, Miss -- So I'm sunning myself in Mississippi for a long weekend and now I'm in Jackson yet I can't find a single copy of state's largest newspaper, the Clarion Ledger.
It wasn't that the boxes were empty, I didn't find any and frustrated I even went to the fancy Barnes & Noble by the Apple Store and you couldn't even buy a copy there.
Again, not sold out. You couldn't buy a copy there as in they didn't sell them.
A chain book store not selling the local paper?!?!?
Is that what the newspaper business has come to, that bookstores won't even sell papers?
Our fine hotel, the Cabot Lodge, reportedly will have copies at the door in the morning and I hope so. I'd at least to see it before I hightail it out of the Magnolia State.
Just interesting, I guess.

 

crap. the local barnes and noble even carries our local rag here in podunk.

 

Maybe it was a delivery issue? I live in the suburbs and never have a problem finding one at gas stations, Wal-Mart, in racks, etc.

 

Man, that's horrible. I can't believe even in the damn bookstore doesn't carry them. I work in a city of 250K and I generally find our papers everywhere, library, gas stations, restaurants, car parts shops, et cetera.

 

Rusty posts here sometimes. Maybe he can shed light on if there was a problem?

 

Of course, if you picked one up and found that, say, the NBA Playoffs had "ended too late for this edition," that would just compound the fail, wouldn't it?

To get the C-L into our north Mississippi market – and, I assume, to the southern part of the state, as well – they pretty much can't get any results from after 11 p.m. in there. I get the impression they'll push that sometimes when nighttime Ole Miss and Miss. State games are involved.

A couple of years ago, we adjusted our standard deadline to 11:30, one edition. It was a cost-saving move, frankly, but it has some positive effects. Now, it's fairly rare that we can't roll with something from the prime time big events for all of our readers.

 

We're a small p.m. that's "in competition" with the C-L in our market. I have to admit I get a little giddy when I see something big happen in a West Coast game, or an NBA Finals game running long, that the C-L can't squeeze in because of their deadlines.

 

Hejira Henry posts here a lot. Maybe he can shed some light on what happened. lol

That's a good explanation. I think it's something all papers face...

 

All any of us in any newsroom anywhere is push the buitton and send the pages on their way. After that, what happens is out of our hands. In the case of jobbing the "fancy bookstores," for all I know they may use a third-party vendor. That, in turn, adds links to the supply chain.

I give the Clarion-Ledger credit for continuing to deliver some version of its newspaper to the northern part of the state. The Memphis paper, much closer to Tupelo than Jackson, has essentially quit trying to get the paper distributed over here.

 

I couldn't find the Tupelo paper in Oxford on Friday.
Oxford Eagle's one box was sold out, something called the Oxford Enterprise was handy at Taylor with all the damn hippies out there.
Stayed in Batesville Friday night, couldn't find the C-L, or the Daily Journal there. Did get the C-A at a gas station and the Panolian was available at the Hardee's drive-thru, but I didn't buy it.
Motored on down to Jackson and was out of luck on the C-L until Sunday morning when the hotel had copies and one awesome breakfast.
Worth noting that the fancy B&N just didn't sell the C-L, they didn't sell any newspapers, no Times, WSJ or USA Today.
Guess, as henry noted, it is likely a distributor issue because they had a rack for papers inside, but it was sticked with magazines and Baseball America.

 

You won't find a Daily Journal in Batesville, unless a very strong wind blows one over the horizon from the east. I would be curious about your Oxford situation ... no DJ boxes, or were the boxes empty?

 

Remember a few years ago they opened a B&N in the town I worked. Invited a lot of newsroom higher-ups to a preview. Looked and saw they were selling our two competitors, plus USAT and WSJ, but not our paper. Didn't buy a thing that night and never spent a dime at that shop.