Journal editorial: BV Journal yearly subscription price to increase March 1

Over the last six years, prices for nearly everything has gone up. As much as we hate to add to your financial burdens, prices are going up at your newspaper, too. 
Part of the reason for our increase in subscription prices is the hammering our industry is taking in the rising cost of the materials needed to produce a newspaper. In the past year, the cost of newsprint and ink prices have increased more than 30 percent, on top of other significant increases that we have absorbed since we first began publishing the Brandon Valley Journal in August of 2016. The cost of postage has seen a couple of drastic increases as well. 
Part of the reason why the current increase in the price of a subscription is so significant is that we have been hesitant about raising our prices. We aim to report the truth, and we believe it is important to informing you of this minimal increase – $5 more per year – before it takes place. With that, we are giving you the opportunity to renew – no matter when your subscription is due – at the current price before increase goes into effect on March 1. 
Mailed subscription rates for the print version of the BV Journal will be $60.71 (includes tax) for those readers who live in Minnehaha County and $79.86 for out-of-county subscribers.
We want to thank our past and current subscribers for your support. Once you consider all that you get for your $1.16 per week investment, including tax – local news, features and sports, opinions, legal notices, photos, advertisements – we hope you’ll choose to invest in the BV Journal. 
These are tough times for the newspaper industry. In the past few years hundreds of newspapers – both large and small, daily and weekly – have closed. It’s safe to wager that some of them were shuttered because they didn’t have the courage to charge what they were worth.
We’re raising prices slightly so that doesn’t happen here. Thanks for sticking with us. It is our pledge to do our best to be the local news source that’s worthy of your investment.