Mike Reed Sets Goals for New Gannett

These deadlines, which are still kind of crazy to me but I do get it, make me think of my dad. The newspaper was his primary news source right up until he passed a little more than two years ago. Of a certain generation, I don't think he was alone. Although my mom still gets the paper, she mostly uses it for puzzles and has adapted to finding things out in other ways. My dad, though, never did. With the new deadlines and things getting into the paper two or three days after they happened would lead to some interesting conversations. Or I'd call and say, hey did you hear about whatever, and he'd say it wasn't in the paper.

I still find it odd driving by our Gannett shop at 5 and no cars are there. I still have it somewhere in my mind that newspapers are hopping always. I mean, my last newspaper gig I worked the 5 p.m. to 2 a.m. shift and I was hardly alone. That's obviously ancient history, but you know what you know. Deadlines of noon and 3 p.m. are so crazy.

 

One of my properties has a 10 a.m. content deadline. Back in the 80s - you know, before all this technology made our work lives easier - they had a 10:30 a.m. content deadline for a P.M. delivery.

 

Same, Roscablo.

For me, it's the paper being printed hundreds of miles away, too. I remember years and years of the 5 p.m.-1 a.m. shift, and chasing the monster stories like child abductions, chases and arrests, where the news broke after midnight, and all hands were on deck, to the point where it was in the morning print edition.

 

I have wondered why the chains have not moved to afternoon papers delivered by the post office. This would allow for later deadlines and also solve the distribution problems newspapers confront with their carriers.

Afternoon papers went belly up in the 80's in large part due to advertisers preferring a morning paper. But those advertisers are largely gone. When I look at newspapers now I see legals, obituaries that the paper charges for, movie and television schedule listings that I assume the paper charges for a few retail inserts. I don't think much of that advertising is going to leave because of a change to an afternoon paper.

I suppose the reason is that publishers are worried that they will lose the increasingly meager revenues from the Sunday edition. But I would think the loss of classifieds and much of the retail circulars would have changed that calculation.

 

One of my former papers, which published seven days, moved to a combined Saturday/Sunday edition a year or two ago. It would make sense if they did this because they switched to USPS delivery. Even 15-20 years ago, they couldn't find delivery guys.

 

The mail doesn't run in the evening, it goes out in the morning.
Our papers, which are mailed, need to be delivered to the post office by about 5 a.m. so they can get them to the mail carriers when they roll out a couple of hours later. So unlike in the past when you could massage deadline with your own pressmen and carriers, now you have a very hard out with the post office. Instead of pissed off carriers you have thousands of papers that simply won't be delivered that day.
Then you have to factor in that your paper might be one of many that are scheduled to print that day, and the papers have to be trucked back to the local markets, all of which require some lead time.
It sucks from a journalism standpoint, but it all boils down to logistics.

 

re: USPS delivery, the deadlines might also not be any better with them, unless you're going the ValuPak or "free shopper" route. If you actually want them to sort your shit properly, the mail clerks get in around 5, 6 a.m. and leave around 2 to 3 p.m. each day. The swing and night clerks are more focused on sorting the higher postage stuff (parcels). Presumably, a paper could get a commercial or business rate and account, but at this point I'm not sure if there would be enough revenue in it for USPS to want to deal with the scheduling issues.

 

Gannett hosted a Q&A on Wednesday about the buyouts, furloughs, etc., that were announced.
Best line of the day from the moderator, who seemed sincere, was that the company received more buyout requests than were expected.
Gee, I wonder why.

 

Looks like we are about past that whole “I do this job because it’s a calling” thing.

 

At one stop, the executive editor would often say, in what he thought
was a rallying point, "Look, we all know we're not in it for the money."

I still regret not calling him out on that: "Hey, I got bills piling up.
And you're making $400,000 a year. STOP IT. I'm in it for money, too."

 

https://www.azcentral.com/story/new...ic-selling-phoenix-printing-site/10565336002/

 

“In fact, I've got some equipment I'd like to sell. The skate sharpener, the massage table, the Jacuzzi, our bus...”