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‘The death-for-profit market’

Little Blog on the Prairie reports that the Champaign News-Gazette has joined the Journal Star in charging grieving families for the privilege of running obituaries.

Anything for a buck.

Journal Star,free obituaries,News Gazette

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This entry was posted 3 years, 1 month ago on Wednesday, December 20th, 2006 at 1:02 am and is filed under Local. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.

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4 Responses to “‘The death-for-profit market’”

  1. gypsydayne says:
    December 20, 2006 at 10:22 am

    I have been to several visitations/funerals lately (unfortunately) and have listened to conversations while standing in line. At two of them, I overheard the grieving family comment what it cost to put an obituary in the Peoria Journal Star. I was astonished. $200 is what they paid. I remember last year when the PJ Star announced that they would be doing a different thing with obituaries, that people could add things like “He was a great man who enjoyed his family” (example). It was of my understanding that if a family didn’t add things & kept the obit standard, that tbere would be no charge. Guess I was wrong. $200 is a ridiculous amount to charge a grieving family. I wonder if the small ones which just tell the name & where services are (omitting relatives, etc.) is the no charge obit.?
    SHAME ON PJSTAR!!!!!!!!!!!!!! SHAME ON THE OTHER PAPERS TOO FOR FOLLOWING SUIT!

  2. another js'er says:
    December 20, 2006 at 11:52 am

    The Journal Star still runs free obituaries. Yes, the short ones are free.

  3. Billy Dennis says:
    December 20, 2006 at 11:55 am

    They are called “death notices” and are far less informative than the full obits that the JS used to run.

  4. Mandy says:
    December 20, 2006 at 11:16 pm

    If I recall correctly, the PJS charges $15 per inch for obituary space. I think the explanation given was that they charge for it just like they would if you were using it as advertising space. The short little obit (not just the death notice) with only the time & place of services is free.