"Since 1959, Delivering Profit through Newspaper Packaging Innovations"


Issue 2

Newspapers are A Pillar of Freedom
Newspapers can use automation technology to uphold this pillar

I believe that newspapers are one of the main pillars of freedom. I also believe newspapers must exist in significant numbers in order for their wide range of voices to let people know the news, both good and bad. A free people need this information so that a collective voice can be heard at the ballot box.
Each day of the week should produce its share of revenue. Otherwise staff must scramble to make a single day of advertising revenue pay all the costs of a seven-day operation.

Another broad function of newspapers relates to our fundamental notion of a free market system. Newspapers provide a window in which enterprises can show their products or services to newspaper readers.

In truth, a newspaper is a perishable product that ages the minute it goes to market. The cost to produce such a product everyday that must compete with other media increases as new methods and technologies appear.

With all that said and done, I also believe newspapers have to make a profit and offer attractive opportunity for future growth.

Proposing and arguing for a change in a newspaper’s rigid, traditional routine – a routine with a 24-hour production cycle and virtually no competition – may be difficult to grasp unless you consider the larger picture of events and ask: Where could you possibly alter the established, daily routine?

One place to look is in the final delivery cycle where time is wasted by old-fashioned, traditional newspaper tasks. This is the point where the complete newspaper sections are assembled with the main edition, then folded and tied or bagged in plastic for home delivery or retail sales. As it stands today, this step is performed mostly by intensive hand labor.

Now consider the three basic focal points in this picture:

  1. What is the newspaper's relationship with the delivery force? Any change would have to satisfy newspaper management's legal concerns to avoid breaching the independent relationship between the newspaper and the delivery force of dealers and carriers.
  2. How could the cost of automation be justified? Which side pays for it, the newspaper side or the delivery side? In reality, both sides will benefit from reduced ergonomic load and time required to prepare papers for delivery.
  3. Can a newspaper grow by expanding the focus of activities that generate advertising revenue? Can the newspaper set aside its overwhelming reliance on the Sunday edition in order to include its daily product as well? In fact, every day of the week should produce its share of the revenue. Otherwise, the staff must scramble to make a single day of advertising revenue pay all the costs of a seven-day operation.

What do you we see when you look at the larger picture of newspaper production? Is it an opportunity to turn the preparation for delivery tradition into a seven-day-a-week profit center?

And how do you act on that opportunity? AUTOMATION.

An old paper boy from the 30's opinion.

Sincerely,
Warren W. Hannon
President - Stepper, inc.

(Read Freedom is Jeopardized and Power of the Press.)