Community Newspaper Publishers Need Fair Rates and Quality Service from Canada Post

Community Newspaper Publishers Need Fair Rates and Quality Service from Canada Post

Community newspaper publishers are asking the Honourable Joël Lightbound, Minister of Government Transformation, Public Works and Procurement and Québec Lieutenant, to direct Canada Post to offer publishers the same rate it offers to the country’s dominant flyer printer.

Canada Post recently consolidated its stranglehold on the flyer distribution market by offering lower rates to the country’s dominant flyer printer than to community newspaper publishers. Publishers have seen a sudden and significant drop in flyer revenue, which has traditionally covered the door-to-door delivery cost of the majority of the 9 million community newspapers distributed each week across Canada.

“The flyer business eroded overnight, and we had to make some very tough decisions,” said Mike Power, chief executive officer of FP Newspapers, which shuttered Community Review, a free community newspaper which served 200,000 households in Winnipeg.

“We are asking Minister Joël Lightbound, the Minister Responsible for Canada Post, to direct Canada Post to offer newspapers fair and reasonable postage rates and quality service," said Benoit Chartier, President, Hebdos Québec.