Dear Yellow Pages, No One Likes You

I recently took the leap of advertising in the YP and have already had customers tell me that's where they found me. Not EVERYONE relies on a computer. It is a FREE publication that provides a wide variety of refedrence information. I try not to be so quick to dismiss a service that is so easily taken for granted.

I still use the phone book a lot for local businesses.

Ya know, the Yellow Pages are the original locavore. If you only check it out, you'll realize that you could be doing business LOCALLY, not supporting indifferent corporations. You know, actually putting your money back in to the local economy may make the people around you happier.

Secondly, the companies want to send you mail, obviously. So think about the energy expounded by direct mail solutions; lots of driving, walking, gasoline, idling engines. Get my drift?

The problem is that een the Yellow Pages doesn't even realize they're green and local-friendly. That may be their downfall.

Why aren't they going broke?

I used to use mine for a cushion when I was drilling through things so I wouldn't damage the surface I was working on... and then I'd recycle 'em. Worked like a charm.

mine go directly from my doorstep into the recycling bin. This is a GREAT post!!

@kenc: They have some magic technology that allows printed pages to detect when they're being looked at and report that information to a database?

I just got my new copy and it went straight into the recycle bin.

There's a stack of these sitting at the entrance to my apartment building. It doesn't look like they've even been touched.

"I guess 12 billion lookups in North America and ads with call tracking numbers in them up 5% last year must mean “no one” uses them anymore?"

I wanna say those statistics are for the website and not the book.

Thank you Yellow pages for all the free kindling you have provided me over the years.

That message will not be read by Yellow Pages- just some shmuck working a temporary minimum wage job. Kinda like yelling at a gas jockey for high oil prices.

I guess 12 billion lookups in North America and ads with call tracking numbers in them up 5% last year must mean "no one" uses them anymore?

In Ontario we were just given the option to opt out (which I did immediately).

Stop it! I want to build my house out of free phone books. Now what will I do.