Why Newspapers are Dying
It has been all over the news for the past several years about the death of newspapers. They actually mean that revenues are down and the corporate giants that own the papers are worried that they don't continue to make more money every year. Newspapers still make a very nice profit, but I think the quality may be going downhill because they have to try to do more with less.
For instance, a few weeks ago there was a front page article in the Wall Street Journal about how people like to chew ice. Front page. Wall Street fricking Journal. I had to check my calendar to make sure it wasn't April Fools day. With economies all 0ver the world ready to melt down (pun intended) and a very important Presidential election going on the Journal decided it needed to get on top of this ice trend. Turns out that many people love to chew ice as a snack and they sometimes go into fast food restaurants just to get a cup of ice or two. This is not flavored ice like a Sno-Cone, or what we in Philadelphia for some reason call Water Ice, just the plain stuff. Connoisseurs pay very close attention to the "chewability" of the ice, we're not talking about those big cubes here but "Nuggets" or "Pearls" and shaved ice.
The burger chain Sonic is well known for their ice. Maybe chewers know this because they read it in a forum on the ice chewing web site (I haven't checked out the site- I'm a bit afraid- I hear they have recipes). Apparently one Sonic store in Texas (part of the southern US "Chew Belt") sold 13 - ten pound bags of ice in ONE WEEK last month. That would be a gross profit of nearly $20.00! Wow! Maybe the economy can be saved from recession after all.
Of course there is a big market for home ice machines too. Country music star Vince Gill got a big "Scotsman" ice machine for Christmas from his wife Amy Grant. Vince is a long time ice chewer - he hates to go on tour in Europe because they are so stingy with their ice. No Sonic franchises in Europe yet, huh?
Obviously I found this article very entertaining, but I didn't know the Journal was supposed to be so funny. Maybe next week they'll have a whole batch of Ben Bernanke walks into a bar jokes. This all seems more like USA Today material- a chart about per capita ice consumption with some spiffy graphics. Fun fact: Compulsive ice eating is called "Pagophagia"
posted by Gregory Owen @ 4:45 PM
5 Comments:
a certain close family member did not even own an ice tray until i bought one for my own ice usage when visiting-----the weekend wall street journal is great----full of non business news---i got a great whole wheat bread no-knead recipe last november--
of course i don't get a vote but i thought that this entry was laugh out loud funny--wow
I have to agree. Thanks Mom.
Hi Greg,
I've never replied to a blog before. God knows, it's all i can do to reply to my emails, but I ran into your mom at the flower show this week, and when I asked her what you were doing, this is what she told me.
I also got to see Abby and HB, who was sound asleep throgh an environmental accost that never fails to give me sensory overload.
Anyway it was great to see them despite the fact that I was having an extreme bad hair day and everybody knows the last thing in the world anybody needs is to be having a bad hair day when you run into your ex-boyfreind's (god, that seems like an odd word to decribe your father with)ex-wife. Anyway, strange as it may seem, I'd just, for no reason I can remember, been thinking about you, Alex and Abby and wondereing what you all were doing. I swear.
So now I have the whole low down.
It's great you're bloging. I always thought you'd be a writer of some sort. Oh and re the death of the News Paper: I guess we'll save alot of trees (or have they all gone green now?) but does this mean we all need to get lap tops to read on the train?
All the best, Erica
(Remember me?)
Hi Greg,
I've never replied to a blog before. God knows, it's all i can do to reply to my emails, but I ran into your mom at the flower show this week, and when I asked her what you were doing, this is what she told me.
I also got to see Abby and HB, who was sound asleep throgh an environmental accost that never fails to give me sensory overload.
Anyway it was great to see them despite the fact that I was having an extreme bad hair day and everybody knows the last thing in the world anybody needs is to be having a bad hair day when you run into your ex-boyfreind's (god, that seems like an odd word to decribe your father with)ex-wife. Anyway, strange as it may seem, I'd just, for no reason I can remember, been thinking about you, Alex and Abby and wondereing what you all were doing. I swear.
So now I have the whole low down.
It's great you're bloging. I always thought you'd be a writer of some sort. Oh and re the death of the News Paper: I guess we'll save alot of trees (or have they all gone green now?) but does this mean we all need to get lap tops to read on the train?
All the best, Erica
(Remember me?)
Erica -
Of course I remember you. You were a part of our lives for a little while there. I heard the whole story that you had seen Abby and Mom. Obviously I haven't been on the blog lately or I would have responded earlier. I guess you can see what I've been up to a bit from my writings ( and most of them are true) Hope you still check out the blog- maybe this comment will be forwarded to you. I didn't know how else to get in touch. Greg
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