Paladin Press: The Closing of an Era
Kevin Felts 10.28.17
Sad news — Paladin Press is closing their doors. The website states, “After November 29, 2017, no more books or videos will be sold.”
Some of the readers may ask, “What is Paladin Press?” It is a book company which pre-dates the internet. As unbelievable as it sounds, there was once a time when the internet did not exist. Before the internet came along, if you wanted something you bought it from a store or ordered from a magazine or catalog.
Let’s go back to the 1970s, 1980s, and 1990s. If someone wanted information about survival, he bought a magazine like American Survival Guide (ASG), Soldier of Fortune, or ordered a catalog from Paladin Press. Paladin Press ran ads in American Survival Guide on a regular basis. It seemed like every time I looked through an issue of ASG, there was some kind of ad for Paladin Press.
To write this article, I grabbed some of my older magazines and looked through them for Paladin Press ads.
- ASG, January 1994, page 9, full page ad.
- American Handgunner, November / December 1985 issue, page 23, full page ad.
- ASG, July 1994, page 7, full page ad.
- ASG, June 1994, page 7, full page ad.
That is how we did things before the internet. People ordered a catalog or bought a magazine, cut out the order form, filled it out, mailed the order form with a check or money order, and a couple of weeks later your order arrived.
Someone may ask, “Kevin, did you ever order from Paladin Press?”
Yes, I did. Somewhere around here, I have a copy of “Homemade C4” and a trapping book by Ragnar Benson. Both books were purchased in the 1990s. Back then I was on the Paladin Press mailing list and would get their catalogs from time to time.
Then along came the internet. No longer did people need to order from a magazine. We simply dialed up a connection through an Internet Service Provider, and ordered from a Web page.
Then came high speed internet, Amazon, YouTube, blogs, forums, and Amazon Prime.
To be honest, I am surprised Paladin Press stayed in business as long as they did. With Amazon allowing authors to self-publish e-books and Amazon Prime offering 2-day shipping, it is a challenge for book stores to compete. Even large book stores such as Barnes & Noble are having money problems.
From the Paladin Press website:
At the end of the year, Paladin Press will be going out of business. There will be no more books or videos sold after November 29, 2017. We are incredibly grateful to all of our amazing customers and authors for their continued loyalty and support over the decades.
Please continue to check Paladin’s Facebook, Twitter, and website pages for more information about the closure and the deep discounts on our current inventory. But remember: supplies are limited. Buy these Paladin books and videos while you still can.
Some of the deals are too good to pass up, so I placed an order.
My purchase on October 28, 2017:
- Arming for the Apocalypse
- Creating the Low-Budget Homestead
- Dirt-Cheap Survival Retreat
- Into the Primitive (Softcover)
- Long-Term Survival in the Coming Dark Age (Softcover)
- Subsistence Trapping
- The Survival Retreat
Grand total after shipping was $51.15.
Readers who know me from the forum or from my blog know I live in a rural area. My long-term goal is to develop a self-sustainable farm; this is why the order has three books about homesteading and survival retreats.
It is sad to see this icon of the survivalist community closing its doors. But nothing lasts forever and all good things must come to an end.
When other publishers would not touch books of certain topics, there was Paladin Press. A special thank-you goes out for their service to the community.
A special thank-you goes to a buddy of mine who told me about Paladin Press closing.
Anyone looking to add to their survivalist library, now is the time.
