ACHTUNG: This is not a fair and balanced story. It is an editorial by the editor.
“Workin’ for the man every night and day.” — Creedence Clearwater Revival, 1969, “Proud Mary.”
When I looked out my picture window Saturday evening my heart sank as I watched the guy who faithfully brings us the Penasee Globe to our mailbox every week. I’m sure he knew this would be one of the last times he’d be toiling at this job.
I am ashamed to admit I don’t know his name, even though I’ve seen it a few times. I have waved to him and exchanged pleasantries while encountering him during my many walks in the neighborhood with Bella the Wonderdog.
At the same time I’ve heard and seen many complaints from customers who didn’t get their paper this week, this guy has been faithful and consistent in delivering a weekly newspaper that until the end of this month has been published weekly since 1884.
I suppose he is considered unimportant as an employee of the largest publishing firm in Michigan, which only last week announced it will cease printing and distributing a paper that has become only a shell of its former self. Once a quaint piece of Americana that helped connect the communities of Moline, Dorr, Martin, Wayland and Hopkins, of late it had become just a wrapper around inserts for grocery ads and other local stores. The news seemed to just fill in the cracks between the ads.
It’s alarming that the state’s largest newspaper publisher cannot continue to make a go of it here. I blame its lack of commitment over the last 15 years and its gradual pullback of reporters and advertising personnel, which made the product a lot less attractive than what it once was.
To be sure, Business 101 tells us the advertising, not newspaper sales, are the biggest and most important sources of revenue to keep the Globe afloat. The paper was made available free of charge with that in mind.
But in these modern times, the greatest expenses for the Globe were in printing and distribution, and apparently they overtook the income of advertising and inserts.
The sadness I experienced had a lot to with watching a man who did his job faithfully and consistently week in and week out, delivering the product on for every Saturday. All for a pittance in wages.
Yet in the end it didn’t matter. As of next month, he’s out of a job. And the Globe’s demise was not his fault. The whole sordid affair was out of his hands, the decision made by corporate bean counters who don’t live here and who obviously didn’t feel a need to keep community history alive.
“It’s nothing personal. It’s just business.”
Yet this hard-working man with no name now must find another job. I suspect he already has another, but he’s just trying to make ends meet. Though he worked hard and did his job well, he was expendable in a corporate world that didn’t care about him.
Even worse, inside one of the last Penasee editions there still was a “help wanted” ad for newspaper carriers. In the words of Rush Limbaugh, I’m not making this up.
You finally quote someone of substance.
John Fogerty? He did write some substantive music.
What the bean counters forgot was that in order for newspaper ads to work there must be a reason for customers to read the newspaper. Local coverage of community happenings with interesting story lines make one want to get the paper. Without that readership falls away. Why put an ad in a paper that reaches so few? Also the ads were way overpriced making it unaffordable for local small business. Good to get the Hardings and Dick’s Market flyers but it became worth little more than that.
Print is dead, print has been slipping away for 36 years. The APRANET (developed by the DOD) helped it die but we, you and I killed it or are killing it. Folks do not read newspapers, why would we when we can get news free on line?
Blame corporate America if you wish but if folks purchased or read paper print media it would survive.
All print is on life support, papers, magazines, news letters, all of it. You are reading this aren’t you
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Good friend used to work for the GR Press. Went right from U of M to a reporter’s desk in spring 1969.
According to him, the GR Press was a cash cow for ownership for decades. Classifieds revenue paid for everything — salaries, hourly help, fixed building costs, etc. The weekly grocery and car dealer ad spreads, plus department store ads, were “all profit. Owning a newspaper was a good investment.
It all changed with Craigslist. Within 60 days of Craigslist expansion into West MI the GR Press classified revenues were down 40% and finally stabilized after he left on his own accord, the handwriting on the wall. But the losses stopped after losing 75%-80% to Craigslist and other online services.