Valassis Pulls Coupons From L.A. Times; 3rd Large Paper Axed From Network

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Valassis has pulled its Red Plum coupons from the Los Angeles Times, the largest newspaper yet to lose its insert revenue. Valassis previously axed coupons at the Dallas Morning News and the Cleveland Plain Dealer in favor of mailing them directly via the U.S. Postal Service. Graphic Arts Online gives this list of territories in which Valassis as transferred coupons from papers to the mail:

Ohio, Indiana, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Utah, Virginia, Washington, D.C., North Carolina, Maryland, and Texas. The distribution shift is in response to declining newspaper circulation …

Read Valassis’ press release here.

While much of the media — including my BNET colleagues — have bemoaned the financial damage the web has done to the news business, less attention has been paid to the impact of axing coupons in favor of direct mail and coupon web sites.

Valassis ultimately believes the most efficient way to distribute coupons is over its RedPlum web site. That strategy has yet to pay off — over the last two quarters, newspaper coupons (FSI) has been its strongest revenue and profit segment.

Jim Edwards, a former managing editor of Adweek, has covered drug marketing at Brandweek for four years, and is a former Knight-Bagehot fellow at Columbia University's business and journalism schools. Follow him on Twitter or send him an email.

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