Racing Post Price Increase

Incredible it’s as though they don’t want to sell the paper version

Should actually be free today as we have to put up with a full page on dettori

be matching the racecourse enerance fee before long, £6 to read page after page of bookmaker adverts

used to buy it 7 days a week but never paid more than £3.50 for it,so thats how many yrs since i lasdt bought it

While the Racing Post does not publicly disclose an exact percentage of advertising-to-editorial content in its print edition, the newspaper is heavily supported by gambling industry advertising, particularly featuring numerous full-page advertisements for bookmakers and smaller panel adverts throughout the racecards.

I still to this day mourn for the Life……

And the sportsman it was never given a chance

Left with one rag….haven’t purchased the thing for years tbh….

I remember Geoff Lester and a few tried resuscitating the life…..

Why purchase the RP?
The Online RP is superior and considerably cheaper

from Monday 9th February for the paper.

Have they brought the Cheltenham Festival forward or will we get another increase second week of March?

Probably the final straw for me. Add on 25p/day delivery and it will be a £185.20 in March.

Not sure about going on line. Is it pretty much the same thing?

I bet they didn't blame the budget

Well spotted Loper, it seems to go up in price just before every Cheltenham Festival, not that I buy it.

Barstool,the Online version has everything in the RP.
One click on a horse gives you its lifetime form plus being able to watch full or finishes of races if you chose the Ultimate Option.
I have had it since it started and it is far superior to the paper version.
You can do a deal if you phone them and I currently pay £32 per month

Seems to be 10% year on year now.

Rising costs, diminishing returns.

Just a matter of time.

Amazed people buy this rag, insanity.

Irons, I can get lifetime form on RP without subscribing.

..... Race replays on ATR.

You can at the moment,Glasgow

... I didnt mean me alone, anyone with an Account can get lifetime form for free, but if it suits you to pay carry on.

Have to be barmy to pay £40 a week for a newspaper imo.

There many things you cannot get off the RP Online for free,Glasgow.
£1 a day is a bargain.
Each to their own

get sick of error message appearing when clicking on links on RP site

You can't get Tom Segal's or Richard Birch's tips without paying.

Have to be barmy to pay £40 a week for a newspaper imo.

   Going to be hard to continue the paper edition imo.

its a vicious circle GC...tbf tho the "over" has already landed on the day the last copy is printed

Increase might be because the bookies are cutting back on advertising
so R.P. has less money coming in.Sponsorship is being cut as well

Seen the radio times in shop the other day 5.50

My Mrs reads Country Living....feck me....it's a remortgage job

Newsprint (the paper that newspapers are printed on) has gone up in price by a lot.

You'd have thought that with less newspapers being sold, the laws of supply and demand would make newsprint cheaper but what actually happened was the plants that made it went bust, so that as demand fell, so did supply.

What I might suggest is the Racing Post is starting to improve under the newish editor. There seem to be more interesting features even if it is a bit tipster-heavy.

The plethora of their Tipsters allowed me to get a discounted rate as I have absolutely no interest in them,Ramruna

Uptheirons.

Thank you for your info earlier. Might give it a try for a month.

You are welcome,barstool.
You will not regret it

I tried it, nogood for me rather pay the fiver

Each to their own

If you are a member of the ROA you can get a 25% reduction in the online subscription

i'll mix it up cheltenham week . basically the only time i go into a bookies nowadays. quick read of the post in there ( punters on machines only ) .  . shop next door to a hills , daily star ; 20 pages inc colours and probably free 2 quid bet to invest in hills  next door .at  home  read timeform summary on betfair and r p on line form  . watch any rtv previews that take my eye . all of this will cost less than half a pint maximum. the paper racing  post is virtually dead . all the daily papers still in my village shop but they have told suppliers no more posts . a few years ago they would sell 5 or 6 on a saturday .

The worst it's ever been. Stopped buying it late October. Utter dross.

£40 quid a week for a paper in 10 daze thyme...simply mind bogglin.

any affordability checks done?

lol ...indeed . the very few times i buy the post ; long train journey , sick of looking at a phone screen . well the lady at the mcr station shop always looks at the screen after scanning it ,just  thinking " it cant be that price for a paper surely " !!!!

The RP first appeared in 1986 i believe.  Pretty sure is was 25p a day at the time as i used to get it delivered on Fridays and Saturdays as it was not much dearer than most other newspapers. And now its going to be £5.70 ? That is a huge price increase in 40 years percentage wise.

Newsprint cost is usually cited as the main factor in price increases, but a paper like The Sun costs £1.20 on weekdays now whereas it was 18p back in 1986.
A much smaller percentage rise over the same period.

I stopped taking an interest in it years ago.  One of the reasons was the “continued on page,….”  Sometimes one article was spread over three pages.  Also, on-line you have access to lifetime form - horses and dogs.  For free too.

Correct Dixie. April 86    Craven Meeting . Picture of Sonic Lady on the front before her reappearance in the Nell Gwyn.

Sporting Life, free, everything you need, anyone paying even a shilling for anything needs urgent medical attention

Maybe everything you need but I like sales prices and pedigrees

The SL is just FAB Deptford.

Irish racing.com
Is the dogs
B O L L O K S

It is Lucky that will now be my go to just looked better that the SL no more RP for me it pigs you off when you click something and there is half a story I was every day then major meets and Saturdays then Sats last yesterday no more when i can have a pint + a bag of crisps instead and get change.

RP colour cards when working properly are the best imo
but irish racing, SL, ATR, TF all fair alternatives depending on what you want

irish racing captcha requests really p1sses me off

Bank of England inflation calculator -

25p in 1986 is 76p in Dec 2025

Newsprint hasn't increased that much ffs

It's a complete ripoff now

Is it a bit like a builder putting in a very over-inflated price for a job in the hope of not getting the work?  Do they want the hard paper demand to die off?

barstool31 Jan 26 11:49

Probably the final straw for me. Add on 25p/day delivery and it will be a £185.20 in March.
Not sure about going on line. Is it pretty much the same thing?

Blimey barstool, no offence, but are you still stuck in 1982 or something!

£1 a day Online compared to £5.70.
Hardly rocket science

And, it is the same for every page you open, which doesn’t sound like anything but keeping five dog track pages open together makes for a whole lot of fewer clicks.

Pretty much stu and don't mind it at all.

Only got a mobile phone last year and it has not left the house yet, only got that because we got much cheaper deal than having a land line anymore.

Always carry and try to pay with cash, not on any social media platforms except this forum. Not that tech savvy but my son helps on that side if needed.

Probably a few more on here like me and the last of a dying I guess.

Thanks for asking and good luck.

I must admit I was a bit of a luddite in terms of the phones too barstool - my missus basically forced me to get one!

But the internet has been part of my life a long time in contrast - I was just amazed anyone on here didn't use the racing post online.

Especially as we all use an online exchange here...

the paper in front of you and online comparison is akin to mince and quorn.

Good morning barstool

Other than the mobile which I’ve  had since 1987 ,I’m very much the same,this is the only social media I go on,,use cash as often as possible thankfully I think the cashless bit has peaked,and need the kids to help me with all this tech even the tv sometimes.

Someone has to pay for Mottershead to go to Brazil to cover the Dettori saga

Should be n coverage whatsoever of dettori

Used to get post, life every day, handicap book , weekender every week, from all that to the sun on Saturdays and big race meetings , sun has all the colors for about £1,30 and interesting articles, use Irishracing.com which I find a bit more serious than the post, I won’t pay for the post as it’s no help at all, other than headlines and a few articles but they ruined it behind the pay wall, can get everything else on line free, the post lost a lot of income from the tipsters millions a year and it was always part of enjoining the paper seeing who tipped what, there own tippers which you now pay for are more journalists the pro tippers, it’s just sad really that it’s come to this, most can afford the post and I would pay it but nothing justifies the £5 plus charge everyday anymore

Why complain then buy ?

Endless list of things i stopped buying because of the vomit price,this included…..

On Saturday ts put up 1 selection at Leopardstown, Today for the same card you have to pay another £5.20 for 4 selections.

Endless list of things i stopped buying because of the vomit price,this included…..

But also obvious alternatives online...even more reason not to pay for it.

Aceform would have struggled to read Janet & John,stu.
Those who continue to purchase the paper do so out of habit

I have cancelled a few subscriptions due to high prices,racing channels and football,never to return,supposing i was as rich as the person who has won one thousand million…..

Principle in life……

Just like chasing a two bit tradesmen……or walking past high food prices in the supermarkets….easy enough tbh….

Tell them to get lost…..

What I've done to alleviate the price increases over the last four years is to cut down on the days I buy the RP. I'm down to an average of four days. Always Saturday and big meetings Ascot/ Chelt/ York etc. If increased cost is the reason for price rises do they really need the amount of contributers/tipsters that are employed at present? Take Spotlight as an example, a couple of months ago over a period of eight days I counted 13 different names writing up the summary/selections presumably all being paid. I've since noticed even more names down as Spotlight in the pages. I don't see why some enterprising company can't produce a simple daily paper only giving the Cards/Colours/Form or perhaps it's me thats simple. Bookies could do it. At present AFAIK Betfred and Paddy Power will give you a print out of the days/tomorrows cards FOC just a simple stapled together booklet which has betting f/casts and is ok. As you may have gathered I don't follow tipsters but I have several that I avoid. Sorry for the rant.

there is a solution to this problem

20 years ago I spent a week counting up the tipsters in the RP (yes I was bored) and it came to 67 covering all sports. 30+ were tipping horses.

Not everyone wants to take a chance on pinching the RP,Busy

Loper. I can easily believe your numbers it's way too heavy with so called experts.

People moan about poor posts on here, but at least it's all free to read - you have to pay to read rubbish tips in a paper!

And, in the main, they are rubbish stu.  Just copy fodder much of it.

Tipsters, too many. But Spotlight writes the form summaries and the betting forecasts as well as the tips. You could imagine large parts of this could be automated but the old Raceform paper ended up like this and it did not really work. Obviously AI has come on since then but at this scale, it is probably cheaper to carry on.

Features and analysis. These have come on under the newish editor. It is noticeable in the forum there are more requests for articles to be pasted here. Critics tend to gloss over these.

News. No comment.

Absolutely disgusting, every single year without fail Racing Post goes up massively above inflation.  This is what happens when you have a monopoly.

True.

Agreed.

I happened to be drawn in by the latest self proclaimed Racing Post pro punter (also a stand up comedian) head line this morning.

It lead me (it was a wet Monday morning) to an on line blog called In The Know with 2 more RP experts reviewing the week's action across the British Isles and it's potential for finding  Cheltenham winners.

When one was asked for his take on the Newbury action on Saturday his response was, 'no idea mate, I was on the motorway going to a football match'.

Turning to the other pro and asking what he thought of the Irish Gold Cup result, his response was 'no idea mate, I was having a counselling session with an ex army officer'.

The proliferation of RP Tipsters enabled me to get the Online at a much reduced rate,Loper.
I told them I would cancel my subscription unless I got a good reduction as I have zero interest in Tipsters

Is 35% the most you can get off at the moment or can you negotiate?

This country is awash with pro punters loper probably more than there are soldiers in the Chinese army..

50% on their Ultimate Option for 12 months I managed.
Always negotiate

Cheers Irons I might give them a ring as I've subscribed before.

RFO ...a pound increase to £6.90

Daily Mirror should be renamed Daily Increase ... Shysters.

Used to love the RFO, don't think I'd bother with it nowadays at that price...

The small paper the RFO used to post for Thursday receipt was always impatiently awaited.  Certain winners stay in the memory banks.  Rosie Whisper, 8/1, made my four horse Yankee.  Gentilhombre.  Others.  Was a brilliantly concise pointer to occasional ( granted ) winners.  Can’t remember the paper’s name.

Racing and football outlook - loved it for the footy too.

Weekender up 70p to £7-20

After getting on for 10 years I've half reluctantly returned to the full RP online  subscription, taking the 33% reduction offer. Had been subscribing to Timeform online for six years in but in the end the fact that the replays give you a forever frozen disc when the stalls open, and the site logs you out after short spell inactivity, while the R P lkeeps you logged in for days on end. There is also the database where you can flick back through pedigree lines with sales prices showing   - yep there are bloodstock sites where this info is obtainable but you'd have to flick back and forth through several of them which is time consuming.

In hindsight, and in connection with Timeform, I wish I'd supported The Sportsman and I cringe when I recall being in one of those pubs on the way to York racecourse on ( prob The Bay Horse) on the day Septimus won the Dante and having a conversation with a few who were very anti RP and pro The Sportsman. I was going on about the visual presentation in the new paper being uneasy on the eye and other nit picky things. Wish it had lasted though in reality the RP itself will be online only in a matter of time as those of who still feel the need for paper versions are dying, becoming physically ill, or becoming mentally ill.