Joe Think: Tales about relevance, context, storytelling, and local journalism

Here’s a list of handy ideas newspapers are using or could use to save that all-important dough. I pulled these from personal experience and observation.

1. Got elevators? If your newsroom isn’t on the first floor, odds are you’re taking an elevator to get to it. Every second spent in the elevator is a second not spent working. Can that elevator move faster? What about the elevator doors — think of all the time wasted while those doors close. If you could just shave a half-second off the speed of the doors closing and opening, man, those seconds are going to add up.
2. Give tours? I bet you do, and I bet you’re giving them away for free now. For shame. How about some “value-added” on top of that tour? The tour of the newsroom is free, but sitting in on that morning budget meeting’s an extra $10 a head ($5 for children and seniors). Afternoon budget: $15 / $10. Of course some adjustments for market size ought to be made…
3. Give your loyal print readers computers. An internet-ready computer can be had for $300. A year’s subscription to the newspaper costs about $100. Hook your loyal readers up with a computer (sure, they have to shell out for the internet), and you’ve got a reader for life (whatever’s left of it).
4. Go black-and-white. Do you really need color on *all* your section fronts? Really? The Philadelphia Inquirer doesn’t: I caught the Monday Inquirer last month, and its business section was all black and white.
5. What about the snack-room vending machines? Those are profit centers waiting to happen. If you’re not charging a buck for a can of coke, it’s nobody’s fault but your own when your newspaper goes under.