Southern Living (1-year auto-renewal)

Like others, even though I don't live in the South. I have been a subscriber for over 30 years. What they have done to this magazine is a travesty. The things that made Southern Living special (and why so many of us saved old issues) are all gone. The articles are interchangable with the articles in any of a dozen other magazines. For all I know, the articles are written by a bunch of folks in NYC who have never set foot south of the Mason-Dixon line!

Having grown up in the heart of Dixie, I've read this magazine all my life, and I preceded its birth by over 10 years. Still have the entire 1974 year down in the ol' homestead (an ultramodern 1970s brick house) in an old cardboard slipcase. It was a wonderful magazine in the 1970s and even into the early 1980s. Today, it is pure garbage. Do not waste your money on a subscription. If you buy one issue, you'll have all the advertising you need, but you'll actually get better advertising of Southern lifestyles by picking up free flyers at various interstate welcome stations. In fact, Southern Living now resembles a magazine comprising interstate brochure writing sandwiched between so many advertisements you cannot make sense of the editorial. I know what I'm talking about. Since it was purchased more than a decade ago by Time-Life, Southern Living has gone steadily downhill. If you want a gardening magazing for the south, choose Garden Gate or Fine Gardening. Or buy books. It's cheaper. If you need travel information, use the internet. If you want home design, forget it. In the 1970s you had houseplans, beautiful landscape designs and decorating ideas. Today, you can get better ideas from a standard like Good Housekeeping or by watching home and garden shows on television. It's really sad how pathetic Southern Living is. If I were employed there as a writer -and it is not my niche by any means, professional corporate writing is -I would be a lifeless card-punching automaton regurgitating segment marketing pap. Pulp. Garbage. You can't even wrap a decent mullet with this piece of garbage, they've shrunk the page size.

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Having been a subscriber for 14 years I can only say that the new changes are not for the better. New subscribers will never know what they have missed.....but us old timers have lost faith. Who said Southern Living needed to be changed? Shame on those who took a delightful magazine from wonderful to wanting. You should have asked the readers.........we would have shared our positive thoughts with you before you took this "improved?" approach.

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I've been a SL subscriber for years. Every Southern woman has to have it. It took a dip in quality in the past five years, but with a new editor the content is becoming more abundant. I look forward to it each month! Purchasing magazines through Amazon are often a lot cheaper than the offers you will get directly from the company. I even tried to renew one year asking SL to match the price that Amazon was offering, but they wouldn't do it.

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I'm assuming the changes in Southern Living happened because of the state of the magazine industry, but it's such a shame. SL use to be one of the best. I don't live in the South, but really enjoyed the great articles, travel stories, unique recipes, decorating ideas and beautiful photos. Also liked the fact that the magazine carried its share of ads, but I didn't feel like I was paying for a book of advertising with few articles, the way I do with many magazines.

Now, all that is gone. I don't really even recognize the magazine anymore. Ridiculously short articles with little content, recipes that I've seen a zillion times, nothing really inventive or even fresh, just recycled, watered-down content. The cover photos are the only thing that is as lovely as ever. SL now looks like every other magazine on the stand, even worse than many. Why in the world? Is this what it takes to get readers and advertisers? I can't imagine. I'm hoping that SL doesn't go under, but cannot imagine that this change will help it stay afloat. Sad that it already seems to be gone. Very unfortunate.

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