AJC ending weekday print editions

You still need a driver or two to get them to the post office. And with the consolidation of many printing operations, that's not always as easy as it seems.
We print at a sister paper about an hour away. We have a driver, bless her heart, who drives over there, picks up the papers, and then brings them back to our local post office and the racks around town.

 

Example of the print product being absolute garbage. My local paper is a Gannett paper and here's the 1A layout:

Top story: From an in-state Gannett affiliate
Right sidebar: Story from AP
Centerpiece: Wild art that links to a fireworks slideshow on their website
Bottom: Ad

Oh, and they didn't actually print this paper. So, as a consumer who subscribes specifically for local content, they gave me none of it.

 

We've traveled to western North Carolina annually for the past 20 or so years and I recall seeing many AJC boxes in the areas south and west of Asheville. That ended probably around 2008 or so.

The execs said there are no imminent plans for layoffs, but you know how that goes. The AJC still has a copy desk, and it's made up mostly of folks who used to be with the Cox central desk in West Palm Beach who now work remotely. Some are full-time, some part-time, and I believe all of them either work on the print edition, the e-edition or both. If and when the AJC does eliminate print five days a week and cuts staff, I'd imagine that desk will be a prime target. In any case, comments from management about "exciting news" invariably mean trouble is ahead.

 

My 74-year-old Dad still gets three papers delivered to him and one of our topics of conversations most nights is about whether or not he got his papers today. He's on a decent run lately but before that it was a shitshow for months. Some days at noon, some days at 2, some days at 4, some days not at all. I'm old enough to have delivered papers as a kid. We were inconsistent, but with parents nudging their kids and baseball cards and tapes to be bought with the money from the route, the papers were delivered by 7 AM far more often than not (here's to you, summer of 1988, when I'd get home from my route, make myself a bucket of iced tea, play Nintendo for hours and then bike to the pool). We also had a small route. Think mine was three or four streets around my house? Now, let's face it, you're not only depending on a less-reliable demo to get it done, you're asking drivers to cover hundreds of miles a day for far fewer customers. It's disastrous and a great way to alienate the last of your base. Good job, execs!

 

My dad is a year younger, BYH, and he and my mom are down to getting the AZ Republic delivered only on Sunday.

They’re retired and certainly have the time to read it, plus my dad has always been a big newspaper puzzle-solver. But the inconsistent home delivery and gradual Gannett-ization of The Republic made them all but cancel after taking the paper since they moved to the Phoenix area in 1992.

I understand the reasons and economics of why newspapers are half-assing it on the print edition, but they’re crapping all over their most loyal customers in the process.

 

My grandfather and then three of his children worked as journalists at some point. I was taught from a very early age to never, ever trust a publisher. I suspect it is still true.

 

'crapping all over their most loyal customers"

LOL

 

What part of that isn't true?

 

I was agreeing with the sentiment in all of its seeming absurdity.

 

I agree. That does sound strange. Bottom line was he didn't feel like it was worth the time with it. If there had been more content he'd have made the time (until his kid came along, and then life went sideways as it's wont to do).

 

My bad!

 

The "exciting news" is likely the bonuses the suits stand to collect for reducing expenses ... and they usually add up to more than the reduced expenses ...