Arrived this afternoon.

Got mine today

Anybody else still waiting on the Mar/Apr issue?

Yes - I am still waiting NW Ohio.

Got mine sometime in the last five days. It was in the mailbox when we got home this afternoon after being gone for five days.

I got mine on 3/28.

I called the PBM office today to ask what's up. They couldn't find my name in the subscription list and said they would call me back.

I hope this doesn't come across as negative. That is certainly not my intent. It also has very little to do with Bill D.

Bill did exactly what he should have, by calling the Pond Boss office.

It is possible the problem could be with his subscription -- but, it is also a possible problem with the US Post Office.

I have pretty high confidence in the Pond Boss office staff. They are very dedicated to going well beyond what anyone might expect of them.

I also have no desire to slam the USPS. IMHO they do a pretty darn good job with all the obstacles they face and for the prices they are allowed to charge.

Unfortunately, bulk mail as used by nearly all magazine and advertising deliveries, has a lot of financial issues. Bulk mail gets moved from place to place when most economical from one distribution center to the next.

For nationwide delivery of any piece in quantities of less than about 100,000 pieces nationwide, for something like the Pond Boss magazine, becomes extremely expensive if sent via USPS first class mail, FEDEX, or UPS.

Doing so, a subscription would increase by a very large amount for two or three day deliveries.

The companies that send hundreds-of-thousands, thousands-of-thousands, or well into the millions of magazines or catalogs, that are received two or three days after drop-off, do so by printing in multiple locations, or by using tractor-trailers to deliver up to 40 tons of publications at a time to regional postal distribution centers.

As I recall, the Wall Street Journal and USA Today deliver about 2-3 million copies daily by printing, via satellite links, to multiple links throughout the world. They get delivered very early each morning to local post offices for that day's delivery.

But, it ain't cheap to set up such a network. Any organization must be at least a 1000 times the size of Pond Boss.

I don't think that any nationwide/worldwide publication of less than several hundred thousand pieces, on a daily basis, can do a whole lot better than what Bob Lusk is trying to do with Pond Boss.

If we want faster delivery, one of the few things we might do, would be for each of us to recruit at least 10 new members, and then get each of those new members to each recruit at least 10 new members.

As time goes by, digital distribution will become easier and more affordable. I love it with other subscriptions. Again, it takes money and size to do it. It involves legal and copyright issues that aren't cheap.

In any case, I'll still want my printed copies.

Regards,
Ken

Got it today. I like a paper copy too. I have started a file to keep all my back issues for future reference.

Only reason I called the office to check was Bob had posted there was a problem with some subscriber's addresses so just wanted to check. Doesn't really matter to me when I get it as long as I get it!