SCROOGEQUEST HIKES PAPER PRICES

By Jacob Marley

WITH Christmas on the way, Scroogequest has hiked the price of its comics in Cumbria.

They’re up 10p this week – a rise of plus 5% – and it’ll be their dwindling band of loyal local pensioners having to fork out more.

To justify these increases, scrounging editorials have been published on Page 2. “We don’t take cover price decisions lightly,” the editorials mew.

“But like everyone our business is not immune to the huge cost rises that are affecting everyone. Reluctantly, we now need to pass a share of these costs on to our readers.”

Before any reader bursts into tears and reaches for the begging bowl, customers in Cumbria are only being told half a story. (No change there, then!)

When it comes to money, “struggling” Scroogequest UK handed over £700,000 in performance-related bonuses to just TWO of its top bosses, according to its last annual report.

The lucky pair also trousered a 14% PAY rise (worth £89,000 between them), while staff had to beg for peanut dust.

The cost-conscious company – renowned for shutting down and flogging off its high street premises – also sent a whopping £22.5 million in dividends made in the UK across the pond to delighted cigar-wavers at its US parent company, Gannett Co Inc.

As in greedy gobble Gannet.

Gannett’s potted palm and marble-floored headquarters are located on the 23rd storey of a skyscraper on the grossly over-priced Broadway in Manhattan, Nu Yawk.

Office space that Gannett could surely sell off for a few million if its UK arm is struggling for bucks?

Or do Gannett’s pinstriped execs refuse to work from home?