Order The Economist via cell phone

Nat Ives of Advertising Age takes a look at the program from The Economist that allows consumers in New York to order a copy of the magazine from their cell phones and have it delivered the next day.

Ives writes, “The Economist’s on-demand delivery service aims to make it easier for occasional readers to buy on demand. It also can’t hurt at a time when magazines’ newsstand sales have been hammered by the recession, which has made people more careful with spending and less apt to visit stores.

“‘The idea is that you’re a reader of The Economist or curious about The Economist,’ said Paul Rossi, the publisher for North America, adding: ‘One of the strategies of The Economist has been to get copies into people’s hands, to get trial, to get sampling, to get people closer to the magazine. This is an extension. We don’t see it necessarily as cannibalizing newsstand, but it’s just another way to for another group of people to get a copy.’

“Overnighted copies cost $6.99, just like newsstand copies readers have to go get themselves. The Economist says the resulting circulation revenue is just as profitable because the delivered copies don’t require giving cuts to retailers or wholesalers”

Read more here.