Mumsnet Premium membership - please support us if you can

[JustineMumsnet]

Hi folks,

First and most importantly, I hope you and yours are safe and well, and that you all stay that way.

After 20 years of unreasonableness, rofls, wtfs, advice and support, and the odd lawsuit, it's fair to say that we are as close as we’ve ever been to existential difficulty.

Like many ad-funded businesses, the COVID-19 crisis has seen us take a big hit to our revenues. The businesses who would normally pay to advertise with us are slashing their marketing budgets, but lots of our outgoings are fixed and we so need to find new ways to keep paying the bills.

We’re doing our darndest to find every single saving we can - lots of our staff have volunteered to reduce their hours, we’ve cancelled all non-essential services, I've taken a pay holiday and we will use every scheme and loan available to us from the government and the bank to help tide us over. But we still need to find alternative revenue streams to ensure we don’t run out of funds in a few months...

To put it frankly, it’s squeaky bum time.

I know this is a very tough time for many of you and some of you are only just keeping the lights on yourselves. We’re sending you our solidarity and we most certainly don’t want anyone to stump up anything they can’t afford, but if you can help, please do subscribe now to our Premium service.

We’ve banged this out as fast as possible in response to the current crisis and it’s definitely not the finished article, but it’s free of banner advertising, so if you’ve ever been vexed by those (or use an ad-blocker) this might be right up your alley. Banner ads also tend to make pages render more slowly and take up bandwidth, so if you’re surrounded by bored kids streaming with their mates, step this way.

We’ve opted for a price point that we hope is doable for most and which covers the potential lost ad revenue for the majority of users. We hope £4.99 per month or £49.99 for a year (less than a pound a week!) feels a reasonable exchange for the value Mumsnet brings you, but in any case you can unsubscribe any time.

Over the next little while we’ll look to add some extra features: things that people have requested regularly like editing, sorting posts by the OP, and reading offline.

Rest assured we remain committed to always providing a free version of the site, as we fundamentally believe that access to the advice and support Mumsnet offers should not depend on your ability to pay.

And if you can’t spare any cash right now… then of course we get it. It would still be very helpful if you removed any ad blockers or clicked on affiliate links around the site when you shop, joined our insight panel or even shared the best Mumsnet threads on your social channels whenever you can - it all helps.

If you have any questions at all feel free to post them here and I'll get back to you. We also have a page of FAQs that might answer your question.

Hold tight everyone.

Love

Justine and the team at MNHQ

What I’m finding interesting is the number of FWR regulars who must be using a different name on here to any current name/ names they’re using there.

Or in other boards/ threads.

Not sure what you're trying to say, Clunge. We know that FWR has a lot of lurkers:

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/3380184-Lurkers-of-FWR-pop-in-and-say-Hi

I personally spent three years lurking on there before I felt sufficiently informed to contribute to the discussions.

I think the fact that you've asked people for money during a time of national crisis is in really awful taste.

People have lost their jobs, their businesses are folding. There are threads on here from people who have no money and who are reliant on food banks and vouchers to feed their children.

And your concern is your business that can afford to pay out 350k a month in wages?

Yes there are lurkers I wasn’t meaning that. Was more thinking about how many posters on other MN boards and threads might be FWR regulars (posters) under different names.
Something I’d started to think about before this thread anyway.

00100001

Sadly it seems like the only news site that is free is Mail Online which has busy comments boards, now Mumsnet is going to be paid for as well. Why is MailOnline the only site that seems to be successful in being free, paid by adverts?

The shareholders fund stood at almost £8.5 million at the 2018 financial year end. Net profits for the last three years as filed are more than £6 million.

This isn’t all in a piggy bank or even a bank account! Businesses are primarily facing cash flow problems right now and Mumsnet’s cash comes from advertising which is being slashed everywhere. They need the working capital and subscriptions are a way of generating it.

Profit is relevant only with regard to banking covenants and accumulated profit (shareholder funds) is utterly irrelevant to a company surviving.

Cash is a problem everywhere. Not least for people on a fraction of an income feeling guilty about not giving. People who already provide the content.

Interesting other brands are giving to the most hard hit atm.

Minty and others - the "trans rights" you so fervently want to promote are the ones that come at the direct expense of women's rights.

Hence why women want to discuss them.

This pic sums it up.

The email was ill-conceived. You are a business not a charity and the writing made it sound like you were providing a public service or charity that would suffer.

I have had emails from our local children’s hospice saying they may need to shut down because of a £2m shortfall. Those smaller charities are the organisations that need donations- not you.

Did the email liken it to a public service? I didn’t get it but my word that us some spin for cash.

I find this to be in quite bad taste too. Many people are barely surviving at the moment.

Mumsnet should be doing what all other businesses are doing, in obtaining the government help available to them. Also taking paycuts and accepting that probably they won't be making any profit this year.

I might have chipped in if it was an anonymous donation drive, but what is currently being put forward is an overpriced service offering no real value for money and no assurances for very real concerns about data security. The answers to previous posters questions are wishy-washy, and haven't addressed the question put forward over and over again.... "Would our financial information be safe given the previous data breaches?"

39 pages in and this question still hasn't been answered.

Interesting other brands are giving to the most hard hit atm.

Indeed and here we have MNHQ asking some of the hardest hit to help them 'keep the lights on' in a time where many are actually struggling to do that in their own homes.

No matter how well intentioned Justines request, when you make the comparison between the 2 it leaves quite a bitter taste in the mouth doesn't it?

Excuse me Minty but people are allowed an opinion and are allowed to disagree. There is no FWR mafia as you put it. What there is a a strong community of women (and men) who are pro women and will stand up for women's rights.

If you don't like FWR then avoid it, if you don't want to respond to someone challenging you then don't engage. It really is that simple.

Would our financial information be safe given the previous data breaches?

Mumsnet don’t have your financial data. The payment provider does. It’s as safe as any other internet payment. This has been answered.

Mumsnet should be doing what all other businesses are doing, in obtaining the government help available to them. Also taking paycuts and accepting that probably they won't be making any profit this year.

If you read Justine’s OP again this is being done.

This isn’t all in a piggy bank or even a bank account! Businesses are primarily facing cash flow problems right now and Mumsnet’s cash comes from advertising which is being slashed everywhere. They need the working capital and subscriptions are a way of generating it.

They took 3 million quid out in dividends in 2016 on top of the enormous salaries and the payments to founders which Justine suggested were £2m earlier in the thread. Please, spare us the sob story and dip into your own pockets rather than the users who a) provide the content and data you use to generate advertising revenue and b) can least afford it right now

I understand that LittleBearPad.

However, a business with £6m profits in the last three years and the level of overheads this company has should equal something to fall back on.

We all know that pre tax profits are minimised - this business should not need a subscribtion to survive at this point.

Exactly. I replied saying not all of it was rot and said why, my opinion, and a certain poster reeled off a completely unrelated thread to this one alluding to sealions and MRAS. Insinuating trolls, blah blah whatever.
THAT'S where the problem lies.

No Willis
You posted:

"I've seen some "big" posters admit that they use the @ function to "alert" posters that aren't even on the thread to get stuck in, then you've got the troll hunting bunbury thread that gets people over to threads they feel aren't going the "right way"

I provided link to the current 'Bunbury' thread with extract from OP post for reference & clarity.

Your characterisation of the thread, its function/use & members was innacurate.
(maybe that's where a 'problem' lies)

Mafia...is that the new nazi?

Let's be fair MN are asking £5 a month, the cost of a magazine and it's not going to break the bank for those who are still working and have cut back on Costa's now it's shut. They can help subsidise the site for those on a low income. Subscribers get a bit of extra functionality but the normal site remains free for everyone else. I won't be subscribing as things are a bit tight here and I am used to not being able to edit my posts now. If I was someone who went on the earning over £100k bragging threads and was still earning that WFH then I would.

LittleBear mnhq are asking for cash from people, many of whom are on a fraction of what they take in. It’s crass. And to liken mn to a public service doubly so.

How brands behave atm is the same as individuals, some will do good things atm others won’t. I can think of a few brands I like that have done some good things, shows them in a positive light.

They took 3 million quid out in dividends in 2016 on top of the enormous salaries and the payments to founders which Justine suggested were £2m earlier in the thread. Please, spare us the sob story and dip into your own pockets rather than the users who a) provide the content and data you use to generate advertising revenue and b) can least afford it right now

Well clearly their crystal ball was broken in 2016.

We all know that pre tax profits are minimised - this business should not need a subscribtion to survive at this point..

But it does. Just like a lot of businesses who are inventing new ways to stay afloat at the moment. You don’t have to subscribe - it’s voluntary but if you can and want to, it will help MN’s cash flow through a difficult time.

MNHQ are asking for cash from people, many of whom are on a fraction of what they take in. It’s crass. And to liken mn to a public service doubly so.

I don’t know - MN has kept me entertained and sane during some difficult times for over 10 years. Plus there’s a huge disparity in income levels on this site. You don’t have to subscribe. It’s completely optional.