Fetching a Good Price

As anyone who’s had dinner interrupted by this newspaper’s circulation department knows, subscription prices seem to vary with the cycles of the moon.

The same is true for magazines, which sometimes advertise different prices in different mediums, a spokeswoman from the Magazine Publishers of America said.

Tired of paying full price for magazines, I decided to take advantage of publications’ discounted subscriptions, some of which are as much as 80% off cover prices. Before signing up, however, I checked out subscription prices on the magazines’ Web sites and compared them with the prices listed on the subscription cards tucked inside each publication.

Of the 10 subscriptions I researched, two were cheaper online. Four of the publications advertised lower prices in print and the remaining four were the same price online as in print. Price differences ranged from $1 to $16.

“Discount” online subscription services, such as Magmall.com (https://www.magmall.com), offered a few bargains as well. But most of the subscription prices weren’t much lower than those offered by the magazines--and some were higher.

As it turned out, I didn’t purchase any subscriptions online because I found better deals offline. A co-worker told me she had renewed her subscriptions on the phone and received a lower rate than those advertised online or in print. I called and asked for the same rate--and saved more than $20 on two subscriptions.

One of the better online subscription services, Magmall offered six subscriptions for less than what the magazines’ Web sites offered, but only four were less than those advertised in the magazines.

In one case, the site charged more than twice as much as the magazine for a subscription. Utne Reader, advertised for $9.99 on the magazine’s subscription card, was listed as $26 on Magmall.

The site’s three-pack bundles, which offer three similar magazines for one price, might be a better deal for some. The fashion pack, for example, includes Elle, Allure and Vanity Fair for about $36. The news pack includes Newsweek, U.S. News & World Report and Atlantic Monthly for about $70.

Advertising discounted magazine subscriptions for students, OutsideReading.com (https://www.outsidereading.com) asks customers to include their school and graduation year when purchasing a subscription but does not indicate how it verifies the information. Presumably, anybody could get the lower prices.

OutsideReading offered the lowest price for the New Yorker of all the sites I visited--only $25. It was also one of the more poorly designed sites. Although the quality of a company cannot be determined by a site’s design alone, I did not want to submit my credit card number here. I don’t buy anything from a Web site that looks as though I could have designed it myself.

I felt a little better about Magazines.com (https://www.magazines.com), but it offered only Rolling Stone and ESPN the Magazine for less than the publications’ Web sites. It charged more for Utne Reader and InStyle.

After visiting Barnes & Noble affiliate Enews.com (https://www.enews.com), which offers the same subscription prices as the magazines’ Web sites, I wanted to find some better deals.

At ABargainMagazine (https://www.abargainmagazine.com), I came across a list of special offers at other sites, including a Magazine Outlet offer for 14 issues for the price of 12. Two bonus issues were not enough to compensate for the higher prices of some magazines. But those interested in such magazines as Wired, which sold for $12 everywhere I looked, might want to sign up at https://www.magazineoutlet.com.

For the magazines I wanted, the offer wasn’t good enough. At my co-worker’s suggestion, I called the magazines’ subscription services and tried to talk them down a few dollars.

Vanity Fair’s Web site offered a $15 subscription. The magazine’s subscription card advertised a $12 subscription with an additional $4 for shipping. I called and asked for the $12 rate--without the shipping charge--and got it.

I did the same when I called the New Yorker, which advertises a $46 subscription on the Web site and a $44.95 rate in print. My co-worker received one for $27.95. I asked for that rate and received it as well. My bargaining power ended there, however.

When I called Atlantic Monthly and mentioned the $9.95 subscription price at the Magmall Web site, the operator told me the lowest price she could offer was $19.95. I countered with the Atlantic’s own Web site price--$14.95--and she agreed to give it to me at that rate.

It wasn’t the lowest price I found, but at least it wasn’t full price.

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Times staff writer Christine Frey covers personal technology.