Junk paper mail / who still uses the phone book

[CA4Now]

Originally Posted by SOON2BNSURPRISE

I am sure the phone book has a purpose. Maybe the same purpose as home delivered news papers.

Nah. Phone book used here: maybe twice a year. Newspaper delivered here: read every day. (And the online version of the newspaper doesn't always have what the print version does.)

[Chatteress]

Originally Posted by robertpasa

I live in Pasa and I receive packets of coupons and ads from restaurants, Ralph's etc., 2-3 times a week. Is there a way to stop this? Also, does it happen in most of LA?

People still get the usual phone books and a third party phone book. You know what's funny? They left these near everybody's apt in my building and 5-6 tenants simply left them there for weeks! They weren't away on vacation - They just couldn't be bothered to pick them up and toss them in the dumper.

I rarely use paper phone books, but I keep them around. Do you ever use those third party yellow book things? I don't know what they have that is not in the usual phone books.

Check with your local post office. I had called the post office to complain and apparently, you need to go in person and fill out some sort of form to take yourself off the lists. The advertisers pay to have that junk mail delivered so they are bound by law to deliver that mail. Unfortunately, my post office is a bit out of the way for me via public transit so I just content with the annoyance for now.

[Chatteress]

Originally Posted by 8bravo

As long as there will be paying advertisment customer, you won't get rid of that junk. Sooner or later even the last plumber, carpenter and pizza service will recognize that this is wasted money and that'll be the time when the phone book publishers will go out of business unless they have switched to other streams of income.

On the other hand, there MAY be still enough people actually using paper phone books and we just don't know...

Phone books come in handy when my internet service is down or if I'm trying to locate a specific type of business. Of course, that is rare so I agree that the paper waste does not justify having a phone directory.

[John23]

Originally Posted by EscapeCalifornia

Its advertising. Most advertising is a waste of money but they do it because the part that isn't wasted pays the bills. It doesn't matter if its TV, Radio, Internet, billboard, or phone books on a doorstep.

Yellow pages is a generic term. Around here, three companies publish yellow pages: AT&T (who owns yellowpages.com), Verizon (under the Superpages name), and Yellowbook.

I wonder what weighs more: A phone book delivered once a year or the constant stream of supermarket ads, Money Mailer, Valpak, etc that hits my mailbox every week.

I never thought about it before, but maybe the original creator of the yellow page concept/idea purposely made the book big, so it won't be categorized as supermarket ads, money mailers, pennysavers. As a way to differentiate.

Why would people save phone books that they rarely use, when they instantly throw away valpak, cheap pennysaver fliers? I think the size of the phone book makes it different in the customers eyes. Very savvy marketing! People sort of "care" for the phonebook in a way that they don't with other forms of advertising.

It use to be just one, I remember that. In the internet age, I haven't kept up with it.

[EscapeCalifornia]

Originally Posted by John23

I never thought about it before, but maybe the original creator of the yellow page concept/idea purposely made the book big, so it won't be categorized as supermarket ads, money mailers, pennysavers. As a way to differentiate.

Why would people save phone books that they rarely use, when they instantly throw away valpak, cheap pennysaver fliers? I think the size of the phone book makes it different in the customers eyes. Very savvy marketing! People sort of "care" for the phonebook in a way that they don't with other forms of advertising.

It use to be just one, I remember that. In the internet age, I haven't kept up with it.

Well a phone book is a listing of tons of businesses in the local area so its going to be big if the yellow pages sales department is doing their job. Junk mail from the supermarket or money mailer is typically time sensitive. The apples on sale at Ralph's next week won't be that price all year. Yellow pages only come out once a year. That's one of the downsides to advertising in the yellow pages: You take a risk on an ad and then you have to pay for it for an entire year (and can't revise your ad) whether it works or not.

[SOON2BNSURPRISE]

Originally Posted by John23

I never thought about it before, but maybe the original creator of the yellow page concept/idea purposely made the book big, so it won't be categorized as supermarket ads, money mailers, pennysavers. As a way to differentiate.

Why would people save phone books that they rarely use, when they instantly throw away valpak, cheap pennysaver fliers? I think the size of the phone book makes it different in the customers eyes. Very savvy marketing! People sort of "care" for the phonebook in a way that they don't with other forms of advertising.

It use to be just one, I remember that. In the internet age, I haven't kept up with it.

The phone book is as big as the amount of available numbers that are needed to print and advertising that is sold within the pages. In some parts of this nation the phone book is quite small.

Here is a clip from a website I found;

Old Telephone Books: Telephone Book Varieties

"In the U.S. there are two most common page sizes. The standard is about 8½" x 11", and the miniature is about 6" x 8½". As a city or region served by a miniature phone book grows in population, when it reaches a threshold (usually around 400 to 500 pages), it moves up to the larger page size. Other countries use sizes that are close, but rarely equal, to the two U.S. sizes."

And a joke I found;

"You know your from a small town when the phone book has one yellow page."

[John23]

Originally Posted by EscapeCalifornia

Well a phone book is a listing of tons of businesses in the local area so its going to be big if the yellow pages sales department is doing their job. Junk mail from the supermarket or money mailer is typically time sensitive. The apples on sale at Ralph's next week won't be that price all year. Yellow pages only come out once a year. That's one of the downsides to advertising in the yellow pages: You take a risk on an ad and then you have to pay for it for an entire year (and can't revise your ad) whether it works or not.

True, a lot of the junk you get is time sensitive. I think if you cut up the phone book into the size of 20 or 30 money mailer fliers, people wouldn't look at them the same way....even if they were advertising the same thing. There's something about the phone book that you "save"....if you got the same information on a little flyer, you might throw it away.

Phone books are also good on trips. More convenient than the internet. Just pull out the phone book in the drawer.

Ever see the las vegas phonebook, lol? About 100 pages of "entertainment" (i.e. escorts). I haven't been there in awhile though. In some towns I've been in, the phone book is the size of a notebook.

The phonebook sort of reminds me of the Sears Wishbook, JC Penny catalog. From a different era when there was less to read in general. And you could have fun looking up coin stores, comic book stores, whatever.