Ok, you may not use a print yellow pages, but you conveniently skipped over some key data from some of those sources you quoted. US adults referenced them over 15 billion times last year. And that’s just the print versions. 90% of all adults reference them at least once a year, 75% in a typical month, and 50+% on average month. How about on average 1.4X each week? And let’s remember that not everyone has Internet access to reference those websites you are talking about.

There is no other directional media that can provide buyers the information they need when they need it about local businesses than the print Yellow Pages. It is truly the original local search engine….

But if you insist that the Internet is the way to go, who do you think is going to get all that neat stuff that is in those print books on to the Net so your Google search actually yields the results you really want??? It’s going be that same Yellow Pages sales rep also has a complete portfolio of local search and Internet based products that they can help small businesses get on the Net…..

Oh yes, just two weeks ago the latest Yellow Pages went from my inbox straight into the recycling bin.
And I was wondering too if the Internet is going to replace the Yellow Pages in the near future - or not.

Ken, I see you point.
But companies like Google are already running initiative to change the industry, see my post here: http://localocation.wordpress.com/2007/08/11/googles-initiative-to-boost...

It'll not change overnight. But my feeling is that the delivery of those heavy printed books will stop one day.

I know most small business even have a website. Hence I was discussing possibilities on my blog how an Online business listing could measure or drive conversion when there is no website, but a real life store to visit.

Any yes, I'm aware that trees are not cut to print Yellow Pages on. It was not meant to be taken literally. Sorry.

I'm using this expression often when meeting with a colleague to stare at a screen together instead of staring on print-outs.

Thank you for posting this. I have been trying to figure out how to stop these. Last year I stood on the front porch and shook my head as the delivery person started to leave them. This year I missed my opportunity and now have three new thick books in the house that are of no use. I live in a major metropolitan area, so these books take up a lot of space. I'm also on a campaign to stop unwanted mail coming into the house, and I put these in the same category as the circulars in my mailbox: Invasive advertising that I never look at.

Right up front I want to say I work delivering the AT&T Yellow Pages to homes and businesses in a city with population over 750k, I have been doing this for over 2 years.

In all that time with literally thousands of book deliveries, I have never once had anyone reject a delivery because they said they don't use it.
I have had declined deliveries for 2 reasons:
The customer already has a current book.
The customer is moving out of town soon.
thats it!

More often than not I have customers requesting additional copies of the book beyond the number I am delivering to them.
I also have found that many customers are best described as "thrilled" to get their new book..it seems funny, but its true.

I deliver year round to homes and businesses that have new connections, additional connections and those that call and request additional books. However in June of each year the new books come out and are mass distributed to all AT&T customers (not everyone as was indicated in previous comment) There are people that know when the books come out and in the weeks leading up to the distribution date I often have people come out of their homes and flag me down asking if I have new books yet.

In years past there was only 1 Yellow Pages, now there are several companies that distribute a "yellow pages" book, these books are usually incomplete in listings and are inferior sources of information, but beyond that they create confusion for the customer who is accustomed to The AT&T Real Yellow Pages.

I think this also has contributed to what was discussed in the topic re: getting too many yellow page books and not having room or need for them.
I will agree that many people use the net to locate business info, however I think those of us who use the net every day often lose sight of the fact that are still a great number of people that do not have internet access and rely on the Yellow Pages a great deal.

You might think that business would lead the way in using the internet to get their information otherwise/traditionally obtained through the Yellow Pages, I have not found that to be the case , in fact business use their books so frequently that they become unusable and simply fall apart requiring them to place 2-3 orders for new books throughout the year.

Sorry for the long post, I could add much more but thought I would contribute what I have learned and offer real world experience about the Yellow Pages and how much they ARE depended on.

I am going mad, when I get useless for example these Phone Books and Yellow Pages, advertisement booklet and many other papers

I'm a bit late to this conversation, but am glad to be tardy. This thread has resulted in some great point/counterpoint that brings to light a few things.

1) People are using available tech/resources in varying degrees
2) The effort to rid ourselves of unwanted materials/ads/clutter is still OUR individual choice, and the original post is a great resource for helping us go that direction IF WE CHOOSE.
3) The effort to go "green" is a noble effort -- and hopefully we will continue to look at the alternatives available
4) There are efforts to join the green effort by companies that we are sometimes not aware. (I appreciated the reply that gives us insight to how the company is getting the materials for their books.)

I was originally going to post a reply that stated I was in full agreement with the original post. I found, though, that the replies contributed significant information to let me understand the full scope. I still will opt out of yellow page receipt, though, because like this author, I do not and have not used them in my home for many years. (One was used, however to prop up a broken leg on an equipment rack in my recording studio for a time, so I guess that counts). So, I'll do my part to opt-out and that will give someone who wants extra copies the opportunity to receive them.

It's great to know that we all have various choices, needs, and insights. Thanks for this topic.

Yesterday I received another set of these useless door stops. We now receive 5 sets of these beasts, the normal recycling pickup will not accept them, so I need to make a special trip to get rid of these.

Yes, I read the earlier comments and understand that many people still want to have an updated set (though probably no more than 1) every year. I have no problem with this. It's true that there will be some market for a limited distribution far into the future, but the days where most people want these will soon be coming to an end. I expect, within a few years, most people will just get pissed off when they see yet another set of pb's on their doorstep.

Today, I made the calls to stop receiving them and was pleasantly surprised by the experience. I expected it to be similar to trying to stop your cable service, or change your phone service, where they make you jump through many hoops to cancel service. I expected that I'd have to get angry, insist that, yes, they do maintain a "do not distibute list", and ask to speak to their supervisor. Instead, they simply and politely took my information, and said they would add me to their do not distribute list.

It seems the pb companies see the writing on the wall, as they have for years been beefing up their online offerings, and know that it will do them no good to piss off their (potential) online customers.

All very good comments. Here I sit searching the web, desperately trying to find a place to locate one single copy of a local phone book that I can keep and use. I signed up with comcast and they didn't provide me with a book. Since I am new to town I rely on the yellow pages to locate businesses, restaurants, and doctors that I may like to use.

Having went searching for two different places that were on the internet yellow pages, after I mapped the addresses out, I found there were no businesses actually there. What a waste of my time.

I want a yellow page directory!

A friend of mine sent me this link after I ranted about this on my blog. I will call these numbers, but I doubt it will do much good as I believe they are just canvassing my area. I have received a copy of the Yellowbook once every week for the last three weeks. I refuse to believe that the reason that I've received three copies is because they print an updated book every week, they are simply saturating the area with their product. In the five years I've lived at my apartment, I can honestly say that I've used a phonebook exactly zero times. I use the internet or call information. I have a stack of Yellowbooks in a closet that at some point I will take to the recycling center.

I would refuse delivery if they delivered a phonebook while I was home, and if they knocked on the door. But they never do either of those. Every time I get one, it's thrown in front of my door, waiting for me when I get home from work, or waiting for me when I open my door to go to work in the morning. I find it completely wasteful, especially when I receive three copies in three weeks. If they had some kind of documentation to take me off a list, I would think they would know that I already had two copies when they delivered the third. As I said before, I will call the number, but I don't think it will do too much good.

But it is good to know that other people are as fed up with this as I am and that someone (paperlesspetition.org) is working on this issue. Thank-you very much for the info.

I have 3 telephone lines in my house, and can you believe I get 3 sets of those dinosaurs?? I totally get that some people use them, that's just great. But having the choice to put a stop to the madness is key. What a waste!!

I end up dumping all 3 sets as soon as I get them, thanks for the information.

Ten years ago they predicted that the print product would not even be around. Well, here we are in 2007 and the print book is still here. The original post stated that the books were wasteful, however that could be farther from the case. You have the right not to use the book, so don't. However You will still get a phone book from some one. Whether its the phone company or a competitive directory. Yellowpages have been around threw all the technology changes since 1886. Stop crying and if you don't want to use it fine. However, you might stop one book from coming, but in most markets there are at least two directories that go out. Thats the truth and you are gonna have to live with it. No deliver guy is gonna have a list of houses not to deliver to cause you don't want the book and he has hundreds of houses to deliver to. I promise people make a mountain out of an ant hill, if you don't want to use the book then don't. That simple.

Thank you for this post. Yellowpages are a horrendous waste. We live in an information age which provides us superior real time information, far preferable than the yellowpages. I know that through using online sources, reviewing customer reviews on Angies List or Wash Checkbook or BBB, I have developed a list of contractors that I depend upon. If that tree fell on my house and I had no power - first thing I would do is call trusted contractors I had learned about online and have written down. Worst comes to worst, I can always take my laptop down the street to the cybercafe - and make sure I get a contractor who is reputable (not one with the prettiest yellow page ads).

The way to stop yellowpages is economics. The phone companies make money on yellowpages not from YOU. You pay nothing. They throw the book at you and count you as an eyeball. The phone companies make money from small businesses who believe they must buy expensive yellow page ads as part of their marking.

Stop yellow pages by persuading small businesses that you do not use the yellow pages. When you go to a new business - tell them how you got there. Tell them you read about them on Angies List, or Consumer Reports, or Wash Checkbook, or BBB, or Google. Tell them that you got there an environmentally friendly way. Small businesses get told that -- where do you think their marketing dollars are going to go?

guess y'all don't remember being without electricity for 6 days during hurricane isabel, your cell phone and internet did not work so hard copy phone books and your land line were in fact your life line. I use my phone books and while they are large and cumbersome, they are useful. The yellow pages often contain coupons for the companies I want to use and it is much faster and cheaper for me to look up a telephone number in a book than to go online or to call information. I am happy for the folks who prefer technology to meet their daily needs, not everyone has a computer or access to a computer or if they have a computer wants to bother with going on line to get simple information easily accessible in the phone book. They serve a useful purpose and great service for many and are simple to use.

Many thanks for the link to http://www.paperlesspetition.org
Totally feedup with this blatant waste of resources.

I am tired of throwing those Phone books away and I am glad there are solutions to it. Let's keep on working on the issue for those of us wish to opt out.

It's a good thing I don't live in Hurricane territory, because I haven't had a land line for 7 years.

Just today I received a YellowPages directory on my doorstep. I filled out a form online telling them to come pick it up as I considered it litter. If I had some extra free time I'd file a lawsuit against them for leaving garbage on my property, but instead I'm going to take it to their local sales office and throw it at their door while I'm at lunch on Monday as it's right near where I'll be.

Weather or not phone books use receycled paper they are still big bulky and filled with ink and dyes. They take lots of energy to produce, and lot's of fuel and enrgy to distribute. The only resource that goes into phonebooks is not the paper. If we stopped producing phone books i'm sure the scrap wood you speak of would goto some other use (particle board, other more useful paper needs, replace the rest of the non-recylcled paper) Also we wouldn't have to use all the energy to power the plants that make the phone books, the gas that transports the books to the distributors, the actual people that distribute them. Some people will still want them and that's great, I don't think anybody hear is saying that phonebooks should completely go away, they are just saying that we can do our part to produce less of them and in a small way make a difference. So if enough people opt-out there will be a lot of rescources that can go elsewhere.

I live in the Seattle area and we must have several competing phone book distributers. We have gotten there sets in about as many months. In fact, after taking in and disposing/recycling the first set and then receiving yet another most people have just left the 2nd sitting out in their plastic bags by the mail box only to be given yet another set! So now the neighborhood is littered with phone books. I have been told that the distributers hire people who get paid just to drop them off and get rid of them by the van load and that hanging signs or contacting the phone companies will do no good. I haven't used a paper phone book in years. I will sign the petition but feel like there should be something more.

How do I go about getting a couple of dozen extra copies of the phone book? I don't want to have to "steal" them from my neighbors. Perhaps when you call those toll free numbers your regerenced, you could just ask them to deliver your copy to my address? I like to have a fresh phone book for everytime I look up a new number. When I look up a number, that book typically goes right into the garbage. Or into my fireplace as the paper makes for great kindling. I appreciate any help you can provide.

Thank you for this post. I am glad I am not alone. I have tried more than once to contact the two agencies (QwestDex and Yellowbook) to stop delivery last year. I had to be persistent, and finally they said they would take my name of the list. Yet I continue to receive deliveries regularly after doing so. What a waste of at least 15 pounds each time (large metro area).

Thanks for the link to paperlesspetition.org. I signed the petition. I say let people opt out if they want to.

As for emergencies, we had a situation ourselves where we thought we had a gas leak so we didn't dare use our computers. But did we use our yellow pages? No, we used our local electric/gas bill for the #. If it is a true emergency and you don't have mobile web, cough up the buck to call information and get the number for a plumber. Or call your neighbor for a recommendation. There is no need for the monster phone book.

I have been trying for years to stop getting these stupid books. We get at least 7 different ones and multiple copies of some. We don't even HAVE a land line! I've even tried to get the delivery people to not delivery them and had them throw them out their window at me and drive off. I've chased them down the street to try to get them to take them back. We have to drive them to specific "phone book recycling" dumpsters that are not convenient. Our recycling centers will not take them because there are so many of them. It's a terrible inconvenience and waste. I never use them or keep them around. I already have phone numbers for emergency needs. In an emergency situation, I don't want to call up someone I have no information about except that they bought an ad in the yellow pages of choice. I will call one of my normal handyman, etc. or call friends for a referral.

What's more wrong is finding my address and phone numbers in the internet directories and white pages- information that are not even listed in the paper yellow pages.

I am a domestic violence victim. I took pains to move me and my kids to a different location, so I was SHOCKED to search my name and find my current address and phone number just out there.

Do you know how I can stop them from publishing my info? Is there a blanket way to do this? I've email that EVIL company INTELLIUS to stop as well as WhitePages.com. But they said it will take 5 days. Plus there's so many directories in the internet. How do I stop them at the source? How do I stop them from getting any of these private info in the first place?

PLEASE HELP!!!! Thank you!

Why doesn't anyone take into account the small things? Maybe some of the yellow pages are made out of Christmas trees. Do you really want for your kid to have a Christmas with a fake tree and no pine smell at all? In the middle of a hot summer morning? I didn't think so.

It's 2008, you can google anything and find a phone number or web page in seconds, why do phone books still exist? The last set of around 40 phone books that was delivered to the building I live in sat in the lobby for weeks and only ONE was taken. Maybe someone needed to hold their door open and didn't have a proper doorstop? Maybe their table had one short leg? For whatever reason that one person took a book, it's not worth handing out one yellowpages and one whitepages book per person without people even requesting them. This should be a criminal offense, it's an insane waste of paper. If you take into consideration the size of just one of these things and multiply it by every family in New York City, that's boatloads of wasted paper and it keeps happening every year. I'm not saying that someone without a computer shouldn't have access to one, but those people should just call and request one be sent to their house. Of course, like so many other sad pathetic wastes of resources out there, it all comes down to money. The yellow pages gets money from advertisers and can only make that money if they can prove their relevance (which they really can't anymore).

http://www.mimoymima.com/about/green.php

Perhaps those who print the books could drop them off at a few places: libraries, grocery stores, common places like that. This will keep people from driving around (dumping carbon monoxide into the atmposphere) and distributing these books to everyone, and will also save on gas, which is over $100 a barrell now (who hates saving a little $$$?) Those who WANT a Yellow Pages book, please feel free to go get one. Wether for a doorstop, for a single phone number (that was hilarious), or for those stormy Sunday nights when your mobile phone has a bad wireless internet connection. Those who DON'T WANT a book, don't get one. I have a feeling that over time, these companies will actually see how many people actually want or need these books.

Great comments about the Yellow Pages. I've been following the episodes from a retailers prospective who has had it with the phone books and is posting updates at Yellow Page the Dinosaur . [Cute].

http://blog.yellowdinosaur.net

They had a link to your site, so that's how I found you.

www.YellowPagesGoesGreen.org is an organization that will contact the White and Yellow Page Telephone Directory companies in your area to inform them to stop delivering books to the people that sign up. They have been very successful is getting books stopped and working with local organization to establish ordinances against the unwanted delivery and uphold local littering ordinances to stop the unsolicited delivery of books. They do not charge anything for this service. www.YellowPagesGoesGreen.org

Fed up with the mountains of phone books thrown to the wayside local entrepreneur Jo King says "I saw the waste and realized that there was an opportunity to make custom table tops out of compressed phone books" . It is estimated that there are over 540 million phone books printed each year many of which are recycled; custom table tops represents one new way of putting the books to a better use. Friends say of Jo "We affectionately call him 'Dextable', who would have known that such a worthless pile of paper could spur such a large local industry".
Jo King is fully aware that phone books may not be around forever. He is currently seeking ways to recycle and ultimately profit from other useless piles of paper. The dollar bill is currently on the phone book table.

I hate those phone books, too. I haul them directly to the recycle bin. If people want and use them, fine. I don't! To me, if they want to continue publishing these things, then they should put them on a disc or publish in a single place on the internet. I'm calling the opt-out lines even though the phone books for this year are already delivered.

For those of you who are like-minded and want to opt out of the YP directory drop (hoping the major distributors will actually print less of these), please visit paperlesspetition.org.

Also, I have created a "cause" page on facebook so we can spread the word and collect some numbers to demonstrate to the industry how much money and paper they are wasting on us!

http://apps.facebook.com/causes/82430

How will these companies listen without a strong message? Only big numbers will get the message across.

(And no, I am not collecting donations - you will see that feature is turned off. We're just trying to collect some numbers to send a message!)

working with local organization to establish ordinances against the unwanted delivery and uphold local littering ordinances to stop the unsolicited delivery of books. They do not charge anything for this service.

http://funs.com.tw/?uid-603

Thanks for all of the great comments. I did sign up at www.YellowPagesGoesGreen.org. One suggestion that I propose is the publsihers mail me a post card with a sticker on it one week before they have the books delivered. If the guy delivery the books does not see the sticker on my mail box DO NOT DELIVER me the book. If I want one I will post the sticker otherwise keep walking.