Verizon, Inverted

The Associated Press is reporting today that Verizon has put in a request to New Jersey regulators that it be allowed to stop automatic delivery of their White Pages telephone directory.  The company claims that this move will save 5,000 tons of paper a year.  Sounds "green", doesn't it?  Yet the report does not mention Verizon's Yellow Pages.  Apparently no request has been made to save those "yellow" trees.

Go to your kitchen drawer right now and pull out the Verizon book.  The White Pages take up only about a third of the book!  Most of it is the Yellow Pages.

The ad sales and listings in the Yellow Pages pay for the personal listings in the White Pages.  This has been the business model for directories for at least 150 years - before the telephone was even invented. 

If Verizon doesn't have to print the White Pages, the profit from the Yellow Pages is increased.  And make no mistake, they have to deliver those Yellow Pages to every home, or they won't be able to sell the ads.  One of the rationales for stopping White Pages delivery is that people can find these listings on the internet. Hey, Verizon!  People can find the business listings on the internet too.

If Verizon is going to turn the directory business on its head, maybe they should invert their logo too.