It is in the nature of subscriptions that they eventually expire, at which point, we let people know (by way of a note included in the final mailing of their expiring subscription), and one of two things happens. Either they resubscribe (which fills our heart with gratitude) or they don’t (which leads us to wonder if they have grown disenchanted or whether they do wish to resubscribe but have merely forgotten).
We are not the hard sell sorts of small press marketers, and so for a long time we erred on the side of letting lapsed subscribers slip gently away. But we have been hearing from more and more of you that you 1) do want to resubscribe, 2) are pathologically busy, and 3) need to be reminded of lapsed subscriptions again and again and again. And so we recently did a mailing to the various people whose subscriptions have recently lapsed. It was a postcard that said RESUBSCRIBE NOW in large, urgent letters across the top, and which featured an illustration of Robbi eating enormous quantities of ice cream.
In spite of having sent this postcard to our good friends Josh and Kay, who have been long time subscribers and who are in the camp of “please remind us until we finally break down and do it,” they did not resubscribe, wondering if, in fact, they had grown disenchanted.
But then an email arrived, with two photos attached.
The basic gist of the email was that the most recent member of the household is a dedicated (and enthusiastic) consumer of paper products. And when I say consumer, I mean it in the literal sense.
This is Cole…
…and he eats paper.
As a result, the unmistakable message of our resubscription postcard was ruthlessly edited.
RESUBSCRIBE NO… Who can blame Josh and Kay for being confused? Perhaps they thought that this was our elliptical way of saying that Idiots’Books was going belly up.
Rest assured that when Idiots’Books goes belly up, we will send you a postcard that says “IDIOTS’BOOKS IS GOING BELLY UP.”
I’m trying to imagine how Cole might mangle that message. The kid looks pretty fierce. I’m guessing he could find a way.
Thanks Josh and Kay for the pics. Thanks Cole for the compliment of finding our postcard so delicious. Maybe if this book thing doesn’t work out, we’ll open a restaurant.
And if any of you out there have gotten this postcard but just haven’t gotten around to visiting our store to renew, here’s the link.
