The End of an Era?

[W. Gray]

The Rocky Mountain News released its last issue today, ending 150 years in business.

The newspaper once advertised for readers in the Howard City Beacon.

KOA radio had a newspaper analyst on today who expects the Denver Post to be gone in a couple years.

The Denver Post is in bad shape even with the Rocky out of the picture.

[frawin]

Waldo, is it safe in saying that the Internet and all of the Network News available has brought about the demise of the Big City newspapers. I know that we read at least three newspapers on-line every morning.

[W. Gray]

I spend more time,  probably, reading the news bites on Fox news.

We read the Denver Post each morning but mine is a fast read for whatever hits my eye. The wife reads it cover to cover and takes quite a bit of time doing so.

We get the Prairie Star but by the time we get it, I have read the big stuff on line.

I like my hometown newspaper online and every so often, I will peek in on the Wichita Eagle. When I lived in Mulvane, I got the Beacon in the morning and the Eagle in the evening.

[Wilma]

I threw the Wichita Beacon in the evenings, but not in Mulvane.  In the mid-forties, it was a nice paper.  It was easy to fold in the newsboy fold.  I tried folding the Wichita Eagle that way the other day.  It wasn't big enough to make the fold.  The sheets have been reduced in size so much that they can't be tri-folded wide enough to make it hold.  And the sheets are so thin they are like slick tissue paper.  It just wouldn't stay folded.  The Prairie Star is a much nicer paper.

[W. Gray]

The Rocky Mountain News, which went out of business on February 27, 2009, is making a comeback, sort of, on July 6.

Former staffers are launching the Rocky Mountain Independent as an online newspaper.

[Rudy Taylor]

The metro dailies are suffering from a dramatic drop in advertising over the past decade. In addition, most of these dailies have been bought and sold several times, each time for huge amounts of money, and they simply cannot carry the impossible debt loads. They're not unlike the huge banks that have followed that same course.

When any business has as its basic purpose each day to repay the bank, failure is likely.

I read the Tulsa World each morning and I notice it has slimmed down, too, but I don't think it is in financial trouble.  It is still family owned, which is a good thing.

The biggest factor in the demise of the daily newspaper business is that many Americans simply do not read anything. They read email forwards from their friends, pastors and special interest groups to which they belong, and they tend to read only that with which they agree. I always encouraged my college students (yes, I was a journalism teacher for many years at CCC) to read openly; think about what is being stated by others; and try their best to be individual thinkers.

Total it all up and the big daily newspapers are not in the formula for success.

[larryJ]

The expense of actually printing a newspaper has increased greatly in the last two decades.  Paper is a big expense and newspapers go to great lengths to save on wasted newsprint.  The Los Angeles Times where I worked had programs in place to reduce waste.  An example would be when a press is started up the first papers are not readable due to ink smudges or no ink at all.  When I started there in the early '70s, we would throw out the first 3000 papers as unreadable.  When I left three years ago, we were "selling" them after only 300 papers.  Sure, the technology has changed making it easier to start up with less waste, but the press operator was in charge of determining when they were "good to go."  There would be some subscribers who might get a newspaper with a totally blank page that the operator didn't see before he let them go.  The company also began using recycled paper some years ago and now uses probably 85% recycled.  Why not 100%?  Some advertisers occasionally demand new paper.  When I started there,Times Mirror Corporation, our parent company, also owned its own paper mills.  Over the years, it became cheaper to buy from foreign companies than our own.  All waste paper was sent to the recycle plant to be made into print paper again. 

Ink is another expense.  35 years ago ink was oil based, you know, the kind that got all over your hands and clothes.  EPA standards began getting tougher and ink companies began making soy based ink.  It was cleaner and actually was better for printing.  When I left, our company was tested for VOC's (Volatile organic compounds) to comply with state regulations many times a year.

The actual cost of producing a single paper is more than the selling price.  A fifty cent newspaper may cost as much as 75 cents to make.

And then, the company has to pay guys like me big bucks to do the dirty work in getting the newspaper out the door.  Ten good typists on computers can take the place of 400 printers at great savings to the company.

I feel that when us "oldies" pass on, newspapers will pass on with us. While the younger generation does have those who read newspapers, losing the print edition will not bother them as much as it would us. 

So with more money going out in expenses and advertising going down, the future of print looks grim.

Larryj