Hey! It’s me, Dave Infante, the one and only guy who publishes Fingers. I’m finishing up reporting on a big story I’ve been chasing for the past week-ish. Watch this space for more on that soon. But in lieu of normal coverage today, I’ve got a quick favor to ask.
As you probably know, this publication is 100% reader-supported, and word-of-mouth is crucial to its financial sustainability. I simply can’t afford to keep publishing Fingers unless I can continue growing its readership, so today, I’m launching the boozeletter’s first-ever referral program (with rewards!) to make it easy and fun for you to help me do so.
But Dave, you cry, however does this work?! So glad you asked, dear reader, because it’s stupid-simple. If you’ve enjoyed Fingers’ independent coverage and commentary about drinking in America, simply invite friends to subscribe using the button below:
When you smash that button, you’ll be provided a unique referral link, and options to share it. It’ll look like this:
About those rewards: to give you some incentive, I’ve set up a referral program with rewards at three different tiers. Fun! The more people you bring into the Fingers Fam fold, the more rewards you get. You know the drill. Here are your rewards:
Get Fingers sticker pack for 5 referrals
Get a 12 month comp for 25 referrals
Get 1-on-1 Zoom drinks for 100 referrals
When you hit the “Refer a friend” or “Share” button on any post—including this one!—you'll get credit for any new subscribers (free or paid) that sign up via those links It’s that simple, and it seriously helps. Have at it:
If you don’t want to toil away collecting 25 referrals to get a free year of Fingers, and you’re not yet a paying subscriber, here’s 15% off an annual subscription. Instant gratification, right this way:
Scroll on for more info on Fingers’ current growth and trajectory in the Spring/Summer 2023 State of the Boozeletter™️ section below. Thanks for your ongoing readership and support for Fingers. I literally can’t do this without you.—Dave.
📬 Good post alert
Thank you to some guy named Paul for sending me this good post. If you see a good post that the Fingers Fam should know about, please send me that good post via email, Instagram DM, or (if you must) Twitter DM, though I’ll be checking the latter only sporadically moving forward.
📈 State of the Boozeletter™️
Things going well for the boozeletter? iN thIs eCoNoMy?! It’s true: after a slow start to the year, the Fingers Datalytics Department is pleased to report we’ve been enjoying a bit of a hot streak over the past three months! The Fingers fam has grown by roughly 1,000 readers over the trailing 90 days, boosted by my appearance on Chapo Trap House to talk about Bang Energy’s former poster-in-chief Jack Owoc in April, my takeover at
’s excellent , and my guest post at Lenz’s wonderful newsletter to examine why modern American politics remains in thrall to the insipid “beer test,” the latter of which both hit in June. That’s almost a 30% uptick in overall list growth, which is huge for this project! Welcome to all the newcomers, we’re glad to have you.The growth has driven corresponding gains in subscription revenue, the literal coin of this realm. Some approximate top-line figures from the past 90 days, for those of you with a rise-and-grind money mindset:
50 new paying Friends of Fingers (up 16%)
$5,000 of new annual projected gross revenue (up 15%)
49% average open rate (this is actually a hair down, probably due to the big influx of new folks, but I’ll take that trade off any day)
These are really promising signs! I’m proud, grateful, and truthfully, relieved—the early spring was a grind growth-wise, which got pretty frustrating at times. I felt like I was producing some of my best work—about the Bud Light shitshow, for example—without really moving the needle on list growth, paying subscriptions, etc. So it’s nice to see a return to form over these past few months, and good to be reminded that there are still tons of likeminded readers out there who want to pay for me fun, thoughtful, adversarial journalism about drinking in America.
The goal, as ever, is to find more of them, and faster. Some people say the pursuit of rapid, infinite growth is a self-destructive tendency of an overly financialized economy, and they are right, unless they’re talking about Fingers! Just kidding, of course, but sustainable growth remains very much a priority here at HQ. To that end, I’m working on lining up more podcast appearances, cross-newsletter collaborations, and the like, because that seems to be one of the few moves that’s actually bringing in new paying Friends of Fingers at the moment. Gotta double-down on what works, and I will.
I’m also hoping you’ll help me spread the gospel of Fingers with the referral program outlined above. As the collapse of corporate media accelerates, it’s increasingly clear that independent, owner-/worker-operated publications like Fingers can be a part of a more stable ~information ecosystem~ built from the wreckage, but it’s going to be a team effort. Thank you for all your support so far. Let’s work together to keep the good times rolling. Onward and upward, Fingers Fam!
📲 The best Fingers meme ever and/or lately
Don’t miss out, follow Fingers on Instagram today. It’s free and your feed will thank you. (Not really, that would be weird. But you know what I mean.) Also sorry for the screenshot. Apparently Instagram embeds, like Twitter embeds, are also broken on Substack (the platform I use to publish Fingers.) Thank you to our billionaire website oligarchs for destroying the internet’s basic functionality in pursuit of infinite profit!