Judith G. Clabes, who has been credited with successfully broadening the philanthropic mission and scope of the Scripps Howard Foundation, will retire as president and chief executive officer of the organization in early 2008. A search for her successor is underway.  She will remain an adviser to the new CEO during the transition.

Curtis Cloud, a member of the Digital Technology International family for roughly seven years, died Oct. 15. He was a classified and editorial systems instructor, with much of his tenure spent in customer support.

David Paxton Elected SNPA President

David Paxton

Andy Anderson

David Paxton, president and CEO of Paxton Media Group in Paducah, Ky., was elected president of SNPA on Monday during the Annual Convention.

Paxton succeeds Ivan V. "Andy" Anderson Jr., president and CEO of Evening Post Publishing Co., Charleston, S.C., who was elected chairman of the SNPA Board of Directors.

Donna Barrett, president and CEO of Community Newspaper Holdings, Birmingham, Ala., was elected president-elect.  Steve Brandt, president and publisher of the Greenville (S.C.) News, was elected treasurer.
     
The SNPA Board of Directors consists of one director from each of the 14 SNPA states and four at-large directors. The terms of the directors are staggered and five directors were elected to three-year terms on the Board Monday morning:

Donna Barrett	Steve Brandt

• Arkansas: Nat Lea, general manager of the Hot Springs Sentinel-Record. Lea succeeds Sherm Frederick, president of Stephens Media LLC.
• Florida: Mary Jacobus, president and chief operating officer of the New York Times Regional Media Group, Tampa, Fla. She joined the board one year ago to complete the unexpired term of Steve Ainsley, who stepped down from the board after joining the Boston Globe. She was elected to a full three-year term.
• Kentucky: Scott Schurz, editor and publisher of the Danville Advocate-Messenger. Schurz succeeds Taylor Hayes, publisher and CEO of the Kentucky New Era in Hopkinsville, who has served six years at the Kentucky director.
• At-Large: Bruce Hartmann, president and publisher of the Knoxville (Tenn.) News Sentinel. Hartmann joined the board in 2006 to complete the last two years of the unexpired term of John Wilcox, who stepped down from the board after leaving the Memphis (Tenn.) Commercial Appeal. He was elected to a full three-year term on the board.
• At-Large: Steve Hills, president and general manager of the Washington (D.C.) Post. He was re-elected to a second three-year term.

SNPA Foundation
At a meeting on Sunday, the SNPA Board of Directors elected three trustees to the SNPA Foundation Board of Trustees.  Elected to three-year terms were:

• Brian Cooper, executive vice president of Cox Newspapers in Atlanta, Ga. He succeeds D. Jordan Whichard III, publisher of the Greenville (N.C.) Daily Reflector.
• Victor H. Hanson III, president and publisher of The Birmingham (Ala.) News.  He succeeds Orage Quarles, president and publisher of The News & Observer, Raleigh, N.C.
• Doug Toney, editor and publisher of the Herald-Zeitung in New Braunfels, Texas, who was elected to a second three-year term.

In addition, Taylor W. Hayes, publisher and CEO of the Kentucky New Era in Hopkinsville, was elected to complete the remaining two years of John Fish's term on the board. Fish stepped down from the board after leaving the Naples (Fla.) Daily News to become a consultant.

Also during a meeting on Sunday, the SNPA Foundation Board of Trustees re-elected two of its officers to additional one-year terms.  They are:

• Chairman: Walter E. Hussman Jr., publisher of the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, Little Rock
• Vice Chairman: Derek Dunn-Rankin, president of Sun Coast Media Group, Charlotte Harbor, Fla.

In addition, Jonathan Segal, president of Freedom Newspapers, Inc., was elected treasurer, a position previously held by Whichard.

Paxton: SNPA will Continue to Focus on Services With Proven Value,
While Expanding Efforts to Build Connections Among Southern Publishers
By Sean Ireland
Special to the SNPA eBulletin

David Paxton (left) accepts the gavel from Andy Anderson (right) at Tuesday's general session.

When David M. Paxton became president of SNPA at the conclusion of this week's annual convention, he stepped into a familiar role: taking the lead of an historic organization with a long legacy and a strong commitment to newspaper journalism.

Paxton, 51, has been president and CEO of Paxton Media Group LLC since 2000, when he took the reigns of the 110-year-old family company from his father, Fred Paxton. David Paxton joined the family-owned company in 1991 as chief financial officer after 10 years in the investment banking industry with Morgan Stanley & Co. and J.J.B. Hilliard, W.L. Lyons Inc.

The seeds of Paxton Media Group took root with Paxton’s great-grandfather and the company’s flagship newspaper, The Paducah (Ky.) Sun. Today the company has grown to 32 daily newspapers, 60 weeklies and shoppers, and an NBC-affiliate television station in Paducah.

There is an added element to the already mighty responsibility of running a large multimedia company when it carries the family name. "It is both rewarding and a bit daunting to serve as president of a company that is 110 years old and has been in the family for four generations," Paxton says. "There is a legacy to be honored and preserved, as well as a challenge to leave the company in better shape than we found it for future generations."

Preserving the legacy of his company’s business and its industry is a key motivation for his involvement with SNPA, where he has served on the board of directors since 2003. "It’s a lesson I’ve learned before, but my SNPA experience has reconfirmed that the more you put into something, the more you get out of it," Paxton says. "SNPA has been serving Southern publishers for more than 100 years. Its role continues to evolve, but SNPA continues to be successful by bringing together people with shared interests and goals, and helping them to be more successful."

Paxton has been involved with SNPA since joining Paxton Media Group in 1991, and he is a board member of the Newspaper Association of America. He is also a director of Computer Services Inc., a provider of data processing services to community banks, and is former chairman of the board of CBT Corp., a $1 billion bank holding company.

He holds a bachelor’s degree in economics from Harvard, and he earned an MBA from Stanford’s Graduate School of Business, a background that well qualifies him to speak to the current state of the newspaper business.

"Changing technology, particularly the emergence of the Internet as a major source of news and information, offers perhaps the greatest opportunity as well as the biggest challenge for our industry," he says. "Newspapers, already the dominant source of local news and information, have the opportunity to greatly expand reach and readership. The challenge for newspapers, as an advertising-supported medium, is to successfully migrate advertisers and ad spending along with readers – or, perhaps users is the better term in our increasingly multimedia environment."

Paxton wants SNPA to help publishers and newspapers successfully navigate this rapidly changing landscape by doing what it does best. "My goal for SNPA is that it continue to evolve and be successful by adhering to our mission: Making Southern publishers successful," he says.

"We’ll continue to focus on meetings and services that have proven value to our members – The Traveling Campus, targeted meetings focused on marketing and readership, smaller-market issues, salary and benefit surveys, and seminars and webinars on timely topics – while expanding our efforts to build connections among Southern publishers by hosting cost-effective publishers forums across the region."

Paxton has been married for nearly 30 years to his wife, Karen, a former accountant with Coopers and Lybrand, and they have five children. Their oldest son, James, works for Paxton Media Group as controller of The Paducah Sun. Daughter Joanna Federico is employed by Tulane University Medical School. Their other three sons are in school: Michael is a senior at the University of Notre Dame, John is a high school senior and Daniel is an eighth-grader.

J. Stewart Bryan III Honored with Mayborn Leadership Award
J. Stewart Bryan III, chairman of Media General, Richmond, Va., was presented the Frank W. Mayborn Leadership Award at the SNPA Annual Convention Tuesday morning at The Greenbrier.

J. Stewart Bryan III accepts the Frank W. Mayborn Leadership Award during the Monday general session.

The Mayborn Award – made possible by a contribution to the SNPA Foundation endowment from the Frank W. and Sue Mayborn Foundation – recognizes outstanding SNPA publishers and editors for their vision, leadership and significant contributions to the newspaper industry.

In presenting the award, Ivan V. Anderson Jr., president and CEO of Evening Post Publishing Co. in Charleston, S.C., and president of SNPA, said: “This year’s recipient has long been a driving force in the newspaper industry and a leader in the communities where his company does business.”

Bryan comes from a family steeped in the newspaper industry. His great-grandfather, his grandfather and his father all worked in the newspaper business.  

Bryan started in the family business as a teenager.  He held summer jobs in the mail room and circulation department.  He sold ads and worked as a reporter.   He also served on active duty as an infantry officer in the U.S. Marine Corps.

Today, he is chairman of a company that owns 25 daily newspapers in five states, 23 network affiliated TV stations that reach more than 32 percent of the households in the Southeast, and more than 75 online enterprises.

His company is known as a leader in convergence and technological innovation in the newspaper industry.

Bryan has served as president of SNPA, chairman of the SNPA Foundation, and most recently, he co-chaired the fund-raising drive that created the endowment to fund the free SNPA Foundation Traveling Campus programs.

Anderson said SNPA is honored to recognize “a friend and colleague who has contributed so much to his community, to our industry and to our association – a man who has shared his experience and wisdom with us with unfailing strength and humor.”

The Mayborn Leadership Award, presented annually, is named for Frank W. Mayborn, the former editor and publisher of the Temple (Texas) Daily Telegram and the Killeen (Texas) Daily Herald who served as SNPA president in 1961-1962.  As a committee member, committee chair and SNPA director, Mayborn provided key leadership throughout the 1950s and 1960s that formed the basis for the organization’s future growth and success.

Until his death in 1987, Mayborn also served as one of the leading figures in broadcast and print media in Central Texas.

Sue Mayborn, Frank Mayborn’s widow, serves as president, editor and publisher of the Temple and Killeen dailies, and as president of Channel 6 Inc. and the Mayborn Foundation.  In making this contribution to the SNPA Foundation, she said, “Frank played an instrumental role in the development of SNPA.  I know that he would be honored and pleased to have his name associated with this prestigious award.”

SNPA Photo of the Year/Aaron Thompson

Aaron Thompson of The Daily News Journal in Murfreesboro, Tenn., was awarded Photo of the Year honors by the SNPA Foundation for a photo of a young boy, surrounded by men, some in the uniform of his father, receiving the flag off his father’s coffin.  Contest winners were announced Tuesday morning at the SNPA Annual Convention at The Greenbrier.

The photo contest recognizes and rewards excellence in photography at newspapers throughout the South.  In its sixth year, the contest attracted nearly 500 photos.

Thompson’s photo, which also placed first in the news feature category, was judged to be the best because of its technical quality, originality and overall aesthetics.  He received a $1,000 prize and an engraved award.

Alan Kim of The Roanoke (Va.) Times placed first for spot news photography for a photo showing police and EMTs carrying students out of Norris Hall at Virginia Tech, one of the major news events of this past year.

Su Anderson of The Gwinnett Daily Post, Lawrenceville, Ga., placed first for open features.   His photo showed the glow of a projector light and how it captured the attention of a little boy during an Easter showing of cartoons.

Bill Ingram of The Palm Beach Post in West Palm Beach, Fla., placed first for sports photography.   Judges said his photo of a Florida football player enjoying his hero’s moment surrounded by confetti made for a “wonderfully complete photograph.”

Kim, Anderson and Ingram each received a $500 cash prize and plaque.

Click here to view a PowerPoint presentation showing all of the winning photos, plus comments from the judges.

SNPA Presents Print Quality Awards
Winners of the 2007 Print Quality Contest were announced Tuesday at the SNPA Annual Convention. The winners are:

In the Under 25,000 circulation category
1st place: Cape Coral Breeze, Cape Coral, Fla.
2nd place: The Southeast Missourian, Cape Girardeau, Mo.
3rd place:  The El Dorado News-Times, El Dorado, Ark.

In the 25,001 – 50,000 circulation category:
1st place: The Galveston County Daily News, Galveston, Texas
2nd place: The Villages Daily Sun, The Villages, Fla.
3rd place:   Times Record News, Wichita Falls, Texas

In the 50,001 – 100,000 circulation category:
1st place: The Eagle Tribune, North Andover, Mass.
2nd place: The News-Press, Fort Myers, Fla.
3rd place: The Lakeland Ledger, Lakeland, Fla.

In the 100,001 – 250,000 circulation category:
1st place: The Times-Picayune, New Orleans, La.
2nd place: Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, Little Rock, Ark.
3rd place: The Grand Rapids Press, Grand Rapids, Mich.

In the over 250,000 circulation category:
1st place: The Oregonian, Portland, Ore.
2nd place: The Tennessean, Nashville, Tenn.
3rd place:  The Tampa Tribune, Tampa, Fla.

Each newspaper was evaluated by a group of independent judges for black ink density settings, spot color laydown, process color printing, color registration, black-and-white halftone quality, page alignment and overall print appearance.

Judges for this year’s Print Quality Contest included: Kevin Conner, quality assurance manager, The Washington Post, Washington, DC; Dave DeBoisbriand, quality manager, FLORIDA TODAY, Melbourne, Fla.; Bob Fruda, special projects and quality manager, The Richmond Times-Dispatch, Richmond, Va.; Jim Ginchereau, production control manager, The Palm Beach Post, West Palm Beach, Fla.; Jamin Goosman, student, WVU Institute of Technology, Dept. of Printing, Montgomery, W.Va.; Charles Kulow, operations manager, Victoria Advocate, Victoria, Texas; Ray Maly, Vancouver, Wash., and retired vice president and production director of The Times-Picayune, New Orleans, La.; Alan Pidcock, press operations manager, The Birmingham News, Birmingham, Ala.; Jay Talazac, pressroom supervisor, The Times-Picayune, New Orleans, La.; Billy Towler, distribution manager, The Daily Press, Newport News, Va.; Penny Wolfe, design manager, special publications, The Commercial Appeal, Memphis, Tenn.; and Rhyda Yancey, quality control – color coordinator, Huntsville Times, Huntsville, Ala.

(l-r) Tim O'Briant of the Aiken Standard, accepts the Prototype of the Future Award from Lawrence McConnell, publisher of the Charlottesville (Va.) Daily Progress. McConnell is a member of SNPA's Readership Committee, which sponsored the contest.

The Newspaper of the Future Contest, sponsored by SNPA’s Readership Committee, asked people to submit their vision of what newspapers would look like in 10 years.  They were asked to think about innovations that would sustain and nurture newspapers – or reinvent them – and how newspapers in 2017 would connect and engage readers and broader audiences in communities by redefining local news and the roles journalists play.

Sixty-nine entries were received from newspaper employees, newspaper readers and journalism students.

A number of entries talked about convergence, always updated real-time news, electronic delivery to a variety of handheld devices, and personalization and customization of content. 

Few envisioned a world where bundles of newsprint would be dropped on doorsteps, but almost universally they agreed that the need for news and information from a credible local source would be more vital than ever.

To read O’Briant’s winning entry, click here.

SNPA Convention Coverage
Coverage of the 2007 SNPA Annual Convention continues below – in the Industry News section.

Audio CDs of most convention sessions, plus PowerPoint presentations, also are available. To order an audio CD and PowerPoint slides, click here.

For a copy of the presentations from John Suhler and James Rutherfurd of Veronis Suhler Stevenson, contact Jim Rutherfurd.  He can be reached at (212) 935-4990 or rutherfurdj@vss.com. They spoke on "What Recent Transactions Say About the Value of the Newspaper Franchise."

Additional coverage of convention general session programs will be included in next week's eBulletin.

McKay Belk calls on newspapers to help Belk find ways to more specifically target customers and build customer relationships. Photo by Lew Whitener/Beckley Register-Herald

Belk Suggests Critical Factors for Increased Partnership
In a keynote address at this week's SNPA Annual Convention, McKay Belk, president and chief merchandising officer of Belk Inc., told publishers that any way newspapers can help Belk more specifically target customers and build customer relationships would be critical to a growing partnership.

He noted that Belk currently runs inserts and ROP in 285 individual newspapers. While the costs for both are lower than direct mail costs, he said direct mail does offer the advantage of being able to target an individual household. And, a recent survey of 25,000 Belk customers told the company that those customers' preferred method of communication is direct mail. "It's something we need to respond to," Belk said.

He said critical success factors to a growing partnership with newspapers would include:

• Growing paid circulation
• Standardized rate cards
• A consistent pricing methodology across the whole newspaper landscape
• Standardized ad sizes to minimize the number of ad versions that must be produced
• Developing a single point of contact for ad sales to newspapers
• The ability to target ads by household

Belk's keynote address and PowerPoint presentation are available on CD. To order, click here.

Publisher Details How One Newspaper is Winning the Battle for Readers
Over the last five years, circulation at the Aiken (S.C.) Standard has been growing and growing, and Publisher Scott Hunter attributes it to cultural changes the paper made to improve local news coverage.

Circulation at the Aiken Standard: 1995-2002

Circulation at the Aiken Standard: 2003-2007

"We believe our franchise is tied to local news," Hunter told publishers at this week's SNPA Annual Convention. "And, because of that, we now place an extreme emphasis on both volume and variety of local news."

Local news dominates Page 1A and it's carried as far as possible back into the A section each day.

Hunter listed a number of changes that he said readers of the Aiken Standard enjoy today, but that the paper previously felt were often beneath their standards:

• More photos, many of which are submitted by readers. These include "grip and grin" or "stand 'em up and shoot 'em" photos.
• TalkBack – short, readable items that readers have called in or e-mailed to the paper. They are published without names.
• "Obits" of the living – featuring interesting people in the community

He says he's been asked if the paper gave up quality, in favor of quantity. "Quality is, of course, subjective, but...I don't think so." The Aiken Standard has won first place for General Excellence in its circulation size in the past two South Carolina Press Association judgings. It had never won first place before. He also believes the paper's coverage of events and the impact that they have on local residents has improved. He says the paper's ability to find out more of what is going on in its community has improved "because our readers believe we will listen to them."

He suggested that SNPA publishers talk with their own newspaper employees who don't read the paper – as a no-cost way of learning why people don't read their papers. "It is my estimate," Hunter said, "that despite working for a newspaper, about the same percentage regularly read our paper as the rest of the community. Oh, what we can learn from those in our building who don't regularly read our paper."

Some solutions he suggested for improving readership:

• Remember that names make news.
• Design your newspaper for fast grazing.
• Be polite to readers and welcome their contributions, even if they don't seem to meet our journalistic standards.
• Treat your work as a daily battle for readers.

Hunter's address and PowerPoint slide show are available from SNPA. To order, click here.

Perona Outlines Strategy for Growing, Retaining Circulation
Although Cleveland has lost population every year over the past six years, The Plain Dealer has circulation penetration numbers that most newspapers would die for, says Robert A. Perona, vice president and director of circulation.

In an address Monday at the SNPA Annual Convention, Perona outlined The Plain Dealer's strategies for growing and retaining circulation.

He says The Plain Dealer is unique in that it sells every single day's paper as its own publication. Some subscribers buy Monday only, Tuesday only or other days of the week. Subscribers also can choose any combination of days for home-delivery.

The front page of each paper notes the 50-cent daily single copy price, while also promoting the 42-cent home-delivery rate. "We do everything we can," he said, "to promote the value of the product."

Included among the paper's strategy for growing circulation:

• The paper has identified 15 major or minor holidays and gives customers who only take the paper certain days of the week the option of purchasing the holiday editions at full price. The Plain Dealer generates almost $400,000 in additional revenue with this promotion.
• E-mail campaigns have brought in 1,350 additional subscriptions so far this year.
• A single-copy campaign is run every year or so with the theme: "Have you read us lately?"
• Apartment promotions, complete with Dunkin Donuts, are conducted by circulation staff.
• Subscriber invoices are personalized with special promotional offers.
• The paper is looking at how it can go back to offering monthly pricing on bills, rather than billing for two or three months at a time. This would reduce the sensitivity on price.

Among the newest program being examined is that of route profiling. For the past two years, the paper has been profiling every customer that it has – on starts, stops, and various account activity. Using the data generated in this manner, The Plain Dealer will be able to identify for its door crews the best people to contact about subscription offers.

Perona's address and PowerPoint slide show, depicting the various promotions run by The Plain Dealer, are available from SNPA. To order, click here.

Convention Panel Examines Growing Readership Among Boomers
Tom Griscom, executive editor and publisher of the Chattanooga (Tenn.) Times Free Press, and Tom Warhover, executive editor for innovation at the Columbia Missourian, followed up on last year's convention panel on Baby Boomers with a look at how their newspapers are meeting the challenge.

In Chattanooga, Griscom said the Times Free Press has identified five topics to help better reach this important segment of the market: financial, nesting, employment, life and leisure, and experiences.

In addition to articles in the paper, the Times Free Press has a Web site that offers even greater coverage directed at Baby Boomers. As one example, the paper has posted more than 800 audio bites of news on the Web site, taken from reporters' interviews. Now, as people read stories in the Times Free Press, they are directed to the Web site where they can hear more – as people tell their story in their own voice.

Warhover told SNPA publishers that the Columbia Missourian has three goals: (1) to be a daily community newspaper, (2) to be an example and a place to experiment with best practcies for the industry, and (3) to be a teaching lab.

To hear about changes taking place at both papers, click here to order a CD and PowerPoint presentations of this conference session.

Metromix Orlando builds on the success of its predecessor OrlandoCityBeat.com. Partnered with Metromix, users will see improvements with enhanced searching capabilities, interactive calendars and maps, more restaurants, bars and clubs and the ability for sharing photos, comments and ratings all over the site.

“Our focus in the past year was to build a local entertainment guide that makes it very easy to discover what you want to do in your free time,” said Anderson. “Metromix Orlando’s searchable databases for restaurants, bars and clubs, and events is unsurpassed in Central Florida. And it is provided by a local staff whose job it is to know the variety and depth of fun things to do.”

“Metromix users will be able to navigate our site much more efficiently with our enhanced navigation and targeted search capabilities,” said Tanya Hanson, senior producer Tribune Interactive/Orlando. “They’ll find the information they want with our updated, detailed listings to make an informed decision about where to go and what to do in Orlando.” 

OrlandoCityBeat.com was launched in late 2003 and targeted the more than 560,000 Central Florida 18-to-34-year-olds, serving as an online guide to local music, nightlife, movies, restaurants, pop culture, dating and living. The site was recognized as an industry leader by winning two prestigious EPpy Awards in 2005. Metromix Orlando builds on that success and brings new capabilities to users.   

The original Metromix.com was launched in Chicago more than 10 years ago and has received a number of awards, including an EPpy award for Best Entertainment Site and the Digital Edge Award for Best Advertising Program. Its success led parent company Tribune Interactive to launch similar sites in other markets. Metromix New York and Metromix Los Angeles launched in July and Metromix South Florida launched in September. Metromix Baltimore relaunched its site in September as well.

“We are excited to bring Metromix to Orlando,” said Lou Stancampiano, Orlando Sentinel vice president of advertising. “It is a well established product and a respected brand in Chicago. It will create new local opportunities for our advertisers and give us greater sales leverage with its expanding network of important markets.”

Gannett Acquires HighSchoolSports.net, Schedule Star
Gannett has acquired a controlling interest in Schedule Star LLC, which operates HighSchoolSports.net and the Schedule Star solution for local athletic directors, the two companies said. Terms of the acquisition were not disclosed.

HighSchoolSports.net is the leader in the increasingly competitive world of online high school sports, with more unique visitors than any other site, according to Nielsen//NetRatings’ NetView.

Schedule Star is the #1 scheduling solution for high school athletic directors, and is the engine that drives the HighSchoolSports.net network. It generates and updates school’s schedules, scores, stats, and game directions, and it can even alert parents and fans to game changes or cancellations.

”When partnered with Gannett’s local newspapers, television stations and Web sites, HighSchoolSports.net will offer national and local advertisers an exciting, best-of-class vehicle to reach teens and parents,” said Jack Williams, president of Gannett Digital.

Scripps Announces Plan to Separate into Two Publicly Traded Companies
The E. W. Scripps Company's board of directors has unanimously authorized management to pursue a plan to separate Scripps into two publicly traded companies, one focused on creating national lifestyle media brands and the other on building market-leading local media franchises.

The two companies that would exist after the separation would be:

• Scripps Networks Interactive, which would consist of the national lifestyle media brands and associated enterprises that operate collectively as Scripps Networks, including television's HGTV, Food Network, DIY Network, the Fine Living Television Network and Great American Country and their category-leading Internet businesses. The new company also would include online comparison shopping services Shopzilla and uSwitch and their associated Web sites. These businesses have combined annual revenue of approximately $1.4 billion and 2,100 employees.
• The E. W. Scripps Company, which would include daily and community newspapers in 17 U.S. markets; 10 broadcast television stations clustered among the nation's largest 50 markets, including six ABC affiliates, three NBC affiliates and one independent station; the character licensing and feature syndication businesses operated by United Media; and Scripps Media Center in Washington D.C, which includes the Scripps Howard News Service. These businesses have combined annual revenue of about $1.1 billion and employ about 7,100 people.

The proposed separation would take the form of a tax-free dividend of stock in Scripps Networks Interactive distributed to all Scripps shareholders on a pro-rata basis. The separation is expected to be completed in the second quarter of 2008.

Following the separation, each company will have two classes of common stock – Common Voting Shares and Class A Common Shares – as is the case now with The E. W. Scripps Company. Through its ownership of Common Voting Shares, The Edward W. Scripps Trust would maintain control of both companies by electing a majority of board members for each.

Following the separation, it is anticipated that Kenneth W. Lowe will become president and chief executive officer of Scripps Networks Interactive. At The E. W. Scripps Company, Richard A. Boehne, currently executive vice president and chief operating officer, is expected to become president and chief executive officer.

Corporate headquarters for both companies would be in Cincinnati. Changes are anticipated at corporate headquarters to accommodate the creation of two separate publicly traded companies.

News Briefs

• Journal Communications, Inc. has announced that its Journal Community Publishing Group has purchased the Clintonville Tribune-Gazette in Clintonville, Wisc., from GateHouse Media, Inc. Terms of the transaction were not disclosed. Dirks, Van Essen & Murray represented GateHouse Media in the transaction. The Clintonville Tribune-Gazette is a weekly publication with a paid circulation of approximately 2,300.

• Extending its gapless blanket Sunday press platform, Goss International will develop the world’s first 96-page web offset press. Commercial printer Grafiche Mazzucchelli will install the new Sunday 5000 press with a 2860-millimeter (112-inch) web width in Seriate, Italy, in late 2008.

Sticky Notes Offer Front Page Exposure for Advertisers in Sumter

Sean Ireland

By Sean Ireland
Special to the SNPA eBulletin

It’s there on your desk.

As you read this story on your computer, there’s a stack of them sitting right over there – next to the phone, probably within arm’s reach of your mouse. There might even be one or two attached to your computer with a quick message scrawled on it.

It’s a “sticky note” – you know, the pastel-colored square little notes with glue on the back that you use as a reminder to back up your hard drive or make that staff meeting at 3 p.m.

That’s what YOU use them for, but do you know what else those sticky notes can do? When attached to the front page of a newspaper with an advertiser’s message, they can bring in thousands of dollars in revenue, attract new advertisers and even bring back old ones that seemed lost to newspapers forever.

One person who knows all this is Jack Osteen, publisher of The Item in Sumter, S.C.

Jack Osteen

Since Sept. 1, Osteen’s newspaper has been selling sticky-note advertising for its front page, and has tapped into a whole new revenue stream.

“Our general manager and advertising manager were new, and they came in at about the same time. They both had experience with (sticky notes) and knew the great exposure that sticky notes could provide to advertisers,” Osteen said. “It was an opportunity for us to do front-page advertising, which we had never done before. They convinced me that it was the right thing to do, and that we could benefit from it.”

The benefits were quick for the 20,100-circulation newspaper, even with an equipment cost of $24,500 and some staff training time required to print and attach the notes. “The goal was for the advertising department to pre-sell 65 notes – using samples from the printer – because that would pay for the machine,” Osteen said. “We did 84.”

Four or five times a week, The Item attaches a sticky note to its front page. The intrusion to readers, who can simply remove the notes if they’re not interested, is minimal. The Item even adjusted its flag slightly to provide a good place for the notes to be attached, where they wouldn’t cover photos, stories or anything else vital to news-rack sales.

Advertisers in The Item’s market have jumped at the chance to be featured on the notes. “Our advertisers like it a lot. We targeted our high-volume advertisers at first,” Osteen said. It quickly caught on, with retailers such as TJ Maxx and restaurants such as Sonic calling The Item with interest in sticky-note advertising. “People saw their competitors do it and wanted it for themselves,” he said. “Sundays have sold out for several months in advance, and political candidates have been calling to reserve their slots for next year.

“It’s front-page exposure that’s removable and can be saved on your refrigerator or wherever (readers) want. It’s a brand-new revenue stream for us. It’s brought us brand-new advertisers, and it’s helped us offset our ROP losses for the year.

“We didn’t know what to expect (in the beginning),” he added. “We priced it pretty competitively.”

Osteen said some advertisers have used the sticky notes to refer to large full-page or half-page advertisements inside the newspaper. Others have used them in conjunction with anniversaries, grand openings or other special events at their businesses.

The Item can run the notes with up to three process colors. But he cautions that the notes shouldn’t be overly complicated. “It’s attached to every newspaper, even the rack copies. It stands out, so don’t overload the note with information,” he said. “We try to think of it like it’s a billboard. It’s more to get people in the store.”

When selling the notes, Osteen said to use samples. “The visual is what sold it for us,” he said. “We avoided selling it without samples. Be sure your salesperson understands the benefits and the customers they are selling to.”

Other tips: “Choose a printer that can produce the note with glue all over the back. Some of them can fall off without it. The best choice is glossy style because they look nicer. On the day it runs, always take a paper with a note attached so that the advertiser sees it when appears.”

Contact Jack Osteen of The Item for more information at (803) 774-1238.

Ideas for this this section of the eBulletin are invited. Some ideas are generated from idea-exchange forums for publishers, which SNPA is instituting across the South for newspapers of various circulation sizes. The forums are designed to encourage publishers to meet with their counterparts at same-sized newspapers to share ideas and best practices and converse about relevant issues. The programs will make it convenient for virtually every SNPA publisher to participate in one-day, small-group discussions with other publishers – with minimal travel. If you would like to submit a great idea, send it to cindy@snpa.org. If you'd like to host a forum, contact Edward VanHorn at edward@snpa.org or (404) 256-0444.

Express-News Offers Worker Buyouts
The San Antonio (Texas) Express-News has offered an early retirement and buyout package to its employees, saying the move is necessary because of a worsening economic outlook. The newspaper's goal is to eliminate 40 to 50 positions "through a combination of incentives and a hiring freeze," Express-News President and Publisher Tom Stephenson said in an e-mail to employees. Read more from the Express-News

1,200 Marketers Can’t Be Wrong: The Future Is in Consumer Behavior
Consumer behavior as a route to effective marketing was a central focus of the largest gathering ever of an influential trade organization. The 1,200 people who attended the 97th annual conference of the Association of National Advertisers heard speaker after speaker address the growing popularity of what is known as behavioral targeting, as opposed to basing pitches on consumer attitudes, opinions or perceptions. Read more from this article in Monday's New York Times.

Reader's Corner contains, from time to time, links that require registration on another site. Registration rules and requirements are established by the host site and participation by eBulletin readers is entirely voluntary. Articles cited here do not necessarily reflect the opinions of SNPA or its Board of Directors. Links refer the reader to the source material.

eBulletin Archives Now Available
Can't remember when you saw it in the SNPA eBulletin? Find it in the eBulletin archives. All of the SNPA eBulletins from November 2000 to the present are just a few clicks away. Here's how to access them:

• Log into the members section of the SNPA Web site – www.snpa.org. If you need your password, contact cindy@snpa.org. Choose "eBulletin" from the menu on the left rail of the home page.Enter your search term and press "Enter." Links to all the eBulletins in which that term appears will be listed. If you'd like to see all of the eBulletins, enter "eBulletin" as the search term.
• Have more questions? Contact anyone on the SNPA staff at (404) 256-0444.

List Newspaper Job Openings on the SNPA Web Site
SNPA member newspapers can post job openings free of charge on the SNPA Web site. To post your job, send the text of the ad to cindy@snpa.org. Most announcements will stay on the site for a month, but you can request shorter or longer runs. Click here to access the SNPA Jobs Board.