I do not subscribe to the Chronicle. When we first moved to Houston in 2003 I ordered a daily subscription. The delivery was so sporadic that I cancelled it after about two months. The service was honestly so bad that I would maybe actually get the paper only 3 days/week.

We have now have lived in a different house for almost four years. About twice per week the Chronicle throws a mini paper edition into my yard. I never read it. am pretty sure that none of my neighbors actually read it. Everybody just unceremoniously picks it up and throws it in the trash can. It is getting really annoying. They seemed to have picked up the pace lately and almost daily I have to pick up an often wet and dirty 'free' edition and walk behind my house to the trash can. Some neighbors don't bother throwing them away so they end up just being washed down the street thus littering our neighborhood.

Any suggestions on how to stop the Chronicle from littering in our yards?

If you are serious and want to put a little effort in it then I suggest you save up the chro-o-trash for a while. Once you get a nice moldy smelly pile you can take it to the Chron building and announce that you are returning um-ordered product. I know one guy who did this once and he had a blast with the response. Make sure you let them know who you are and why you are doing it and bring a friend with a video camera to record the fun.

My theory is that the subscriptions are way down, but they promise advertisers that a certain number of households (greater than their number of subscriptions) will get their ads. Hence, people who don't subscribe get the Sunday ads as well.

I like the concept of getting the newspaper, but it was just stacking up in our recycling bin because we never opened it. When they called asking me to renew and I declined, the incredulously asked "Where in the world are you going to get your news?"

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My theory is that the subscriptions are way down, but they promise advertisers that a certain number of households (greater than their number of subscriptions) will get their ads. Hence, people who don't subscribe get the Sunday ads as well.

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I'm sure that's exactly why they do it. I don't get the free throws in my neighborhood, but I get my mailbox stuffed with their coupon bundle a couple times a week. Back when I lived in an apartment complex, there would be a few weeks out of the year when every single unit got a free paper on the stoop - obviously pumping up their circulation numbers for audit time.

you have an HOA? you might be able to use them for leverage or something.

otherwise we might have to wait for print media to die to stop all the waste.

I have a Sunday-only subscription for the coupons. The Chronicle calls me probably every 3 months to congratulate me because they want to give me Thursday-Saturday for free and it takes me 15 minutes to convince them that in no way do I want them using me to raise the circulation for their crappy paper- I just want my coupons. They always sound shocked and ofended that I don't want their "gift" of extra trash. Usually I have to threaten to cancel before they back off and leave me alone.

I've got the same issue in my subbdivision. They drop off a free paper that I do not want. I tried to contact the chronicle via e-mail and phone with no luck - they never picked up the phone or responded to my e-mail. I'd like to find a solution to this too.

Same here. I pick up soggy free papers from the Chron (as well as other neighborhood "news" ) every Thursday when I take out the bin. At least the neighborhood rags are in old-school plastic bags, so if not drenched, I can dump the contents out of the bag into the recycle bin. The Chron delivery is in that shrink-wrapped package that I don't take the time to tear open, so it all goes in the trash.

Could this be something that the Mayor / City would be interested in as part of their campaign to make Houston more green? That's a lot of wasted paper that either doesn't or can't be recycled, as well as a lot of unnecessary plastic going to the landfill.

Calling RTT, calling RTT.

[This message has been edited by HtownAg92 (edited 2/2/2011 9:23a).]

I live in the Cypress area and it happens out there too. Drives me crazy.

We fought with The Chronicle for a good 2-3 years trying to get them to stop delivering when we didn't even have a subscription. They finally gave us the number of the actual delivery person and once we spoke to him it finally stopped showing up.

"The Good Life" section shows up my yard every Sat night or Sunday morning. It promptly hits the trash. I would certain like it stop.

Chronicle has no control over it. It's the "independent contractor" deliverers.

Not true 7nine. Maybe if there's a mistake on one address or something, but not on the mass distribution stuff.

My coworker has been trying to get the chron advertising material dropped on his driveway stopped for over a year. He has been told repeatedly that he must contact that area courier.

tell all those liberals in the press to stop wasting needed energy

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The Chronicle calls me probably every 3 months to congratulate me because they want to give me Thursday-Saturday for free

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They do that for me too. I tell them I want Saturday and Sunday only. They use to do this but not anymore. I have yet to talk to one that understands I don't want it Thursday and Friday because it is more trouble than it's worth.

We take the coupons out and then throw it away.

We used to get the chronicle for free because i have relative to work there. It literally took 3 years and about 50 angry phone calls to cancel it. I finally got fed up with their customer service reps and got the delivery guys phone number. After one message on his voice mail my paper magically stopped.