No cash needed for London paper

Every day hundreds of thousands of Londoners take the Underground to and from work, and most read the Evening Standard, which is a London institution. Times are changing for the Evening Standard. This man has been selling the Evening Standard for 25 years and talks about how readership has dropped. There’s a lot more to distract former newspaper readers, and on top of that there are now two new free newspapers. But now the Evening Standard is introducing technology to boost readership by introducing its cashless card. It’s not a free give away but a cash list payment system. The Sales and Marketing Director explains how it works: the card is in my wallet, I take the card and tap it against the machine and tells me I have credits in my card so I take the paper and move on. This card uses a communication field so you have to touch it to a machine to pay. The Marketing Director also says the card conveys important information about the user’s buying habits. So is this card the future for the pay press? This analyst thinks ease of use and convenience is key. Some commuters are open to the idea, but some aren’t.