Full article: Dismal Results from a Print Periodical Usage Study

"Print periodicals have been a cornerstone of libraries for over 100 years. Over the past 20 years print periodicals have been eclipsed by online journal databases and individual e-journals, but most libraries still subscribe to some print journals. In 2019 Tennessee Technological University  undertook a thorough study of the usage of the current print periodical subscriptions by attaching survey forms to the covers of recent issues. The results showed that most newspapers and scholarly print periodicals were not used at all and the majority could be cancelled. Popular magazines showed slightly higher usage, but many of them could be dropped as well....

As a profession we need to make data driven decisions. Even though libraries have been cutting print periodical expenditures for many decades, it may be time to cut even more. It may be common knowledge that print periodical usage is down, but it may not be common knowledge that usage is zero."