The Economist offers custom home delivery with a newsstand price

The Economist has introduced a trial program in New York City that allows people who have signed up for weekly e-mail alerts on their cellphones about what's in the next edition and have it home-delivered overnight at the newsstand price.

According to a story in Advertising Age, the approach was tested successfully in Britain two months ago, but with a simpler interface -- people who were preregistered to get text alerts could just reply to a text to get their overnight copies. In New York, they receive a URL, which they must visit to order a copy. The Economist says it hopes to simplify the system by the time it extends the system to the rest of the (presumably urban) U.S.

Those who order by 9 p.m. are guaranteed a hand-delivered copy by 6 a.m. the next morning -- in time to beat the commute. The weekly texts go out on Thursday afternoons, meaning recipients can get overnight copies before newsstands get them at about 9 a.m.

Overnighted single copies cost $6.99, same as on the newsstand and the company said that it expected that the cellphone program would remain very small -- in Britain, it numbered in the hundreds. But the hope is that it will give The Economist insight into its occasional buyers, including what news subjects most resonate with them.

"The idea is that you're a reader of The Economist or curious about The Economist," said Paul Rossi, the publisher for North America, adding: "One of the strategies of The Economist has been to get copies into people's hands, to get trial, to get sampling, to get people closer to the magazine. This is an extension. We don't see it necessarily as cannibalizing newsstand, but it's just another way to for another group of people to get a copy."