Re: The Journal of Experimental Biology - price increase

["Sally Morris \(Chief Executive\)" <sally.morris@alpsp.org>]

This is the problem with any improved pricing structure - there 
are winners and losers. Those who win will love it. Those who 
lose will hate it. Never mind that it's fairer - heavy users tend 
to be large, vocal and influential customers.  What's a publisher 
to do?

Sally Morris, Chief Executive
Association of Learned and Professional Society Publishers
Email: sally.morris@alpsp.org
Website:  www.alpsp.org

----- Original Message -----
From: "Nick Birch" <nick@biologists.com>
To: <liblicense-l@lists.yale.edu>; <sts-l@ala.org>
Sent: Wednesday, November 22, 2006 12:07 AM
Subject: RE: The Journal of Experimental Biology - price increase

> The Journal of Experimental Biology
>
> David Stern and I have had some direct e-mail contact on the 
> point he raised a few days ago about the 2007 price rise for 
> the Company of Biologists' journal, The Journal of Experimental 
> Biology. However I think it might be useful to offer some 
> clarification on our 2007 pricing policy for liblicense users 
> generally.
>
> Whilst I'm obviously not able to go into details about Yale's 
> negotiations with the Company for 2007 subscriptions, I can 
> confirm that David's posting was based on a misapprehension 
> about what Yale is currently paying for its 2006 subscription.
>
> In fact the year on year price increase proposed by CoB on a 
> like for like renewal basis is 5% as is the case with the 
> majority of our tier 5/multi-site subscribers.
>
> In adopting a tiered pricing system we have been very aware of 
> the need think extremely carefully about price increases 
> generally and especially for the largest institutional users. 
> Under our system, the maximum any institution could pay more 
> than before is 15%, many smaller institutions will actually be 
> paying rather less than in 2006 and probably the largest 
> percentage will see their prices increase by around 5%. Those 
> institutions moving from print plus online to online only would 
> see significant reductions on their 2006 prices.
>
> As has been announced we do not anticipate increasing our 
> revenue through adopting tiered pricing by any more than is 
> neccesary to cover the rate of inflation. Instead we are trying 
> to adopt a system that is fairer for all institutions in 
> relation to their size and potential usage.
>
> Nick Birch
> Sales and Marketing Manager
> The Company of Biologists Limited
> Cambridge CB4 0DL, UK
> www.biologists.org
> Please note new e-mail: nick@biologists.com
>
> -----Original Message-----
> [mailto:owner-liblicense-l@lists.yale.edu]On Behalf Of David Stern
> Sent: 16 November 2006 15:34
> To: sts-l@ala.org; liblicense-l@lists.yale.edu
> Subject: The Journal of Experimental Biology - price increase
>
> The Journal of Experimental Biology
> The Company of Biologists Ltd
>         http://jeb.biologists.org/
>
> While I applaud innovation and fair pricing, the new tiered
> pricing system represents an increase from just over $1,000 to
> just over $4,000 for large research libraries.
>
> Perhaps there is a way to move to this scheme, providing less
> cost to smaller libraries, without doing it in one year through
> untenable price increases to large libraries?
>
> David Stern Director of Science Libraries and Information Services
> Kline Science Library
> New Haven, CT 06520-8111
> phone:  203 432-3447
> fax:  203 432-3441 email:
> david.e.stern@yale.edu