Extra hassle from extra issue

Under the heading of “no good deed goes unpunished,” I cannot help but relate this anecdote relating to the first State of the Industry special issue of Numismatic News that we recently put into the mail.

It was filled with commentary from the numismatic industry’s leaders as well as from readers.

The cover date is Nov. 14. That is three days after the prior regular issue and four days before the following regular issue. It is an extra issue.

I received a phone call Wednesday from an upset caller. He wanted to tell me in no uncertain terms that he had canceled his subscription because we had completely changed Numismatic News.

I told him we hadn’t completely changed the paper and asked him what was the date of the issue that he was referring to. I thought I knew what he would tell me and I was correct in this.

When he told me, I said indeed this particular issue was different, but it was a special extra issue.

That didn’t stop him.

He wanted me to know that Ken Pines did not have his usual ad on Pages 2 and 3 and rattled off a few more of his favorite advertisers that he did not spot on the usual pages.

I repeated that this was a special extra issue and the usual advertisers would be in their usual places in the following issue.

I asked why he called me after he had already canceled his subscription.

He responded that he wanted to be sure I knew he didn’t like the fact that we had completely changed the paper.

I repeated that we had not completely changed the paper, but it was a point I knew I had already lost. After all, he had the evidence. He had a completely different looking issue in his hand.

I thanked him for his call.