By Suzie Glassman, Particular to Colorado Group Media
Colorado Group Media’s two dozen newspapers will get a much-needed lifeline within the type of a printing press, permitting it to carry printing wants in-house whereas lowering prices and offering a longer-term answer for different publishers alongside the Entrance Vary.
The Nationwide Belief for Native Information, which owns Colorado Group Media, bought the press after elevating $900,000 in grant funding towards the mission. The donations got here by means of the Colorado Media Venture and its coalition of funders: the Bohemian Basis, Gates Household Basis and the Colorado Belief.
Amalie Nash, head of transformation for NTLN, mentioned the hope is to start out printing CCM’s newspapers on the press, positioned in northeast Denver, by the tip of Might. By summer time, the Belief plans to supply printing companies to different newspapers in search of a extra inexpensive answer.
The trouble to purchase the press started after Gannett Publishing Co., which owns the USA TODAY Community, introduced it was closing its plant in Pueblo in August. With few locations left to show, greater than 80 Colorado publications that relied on the Pueblo press, together with these at CCM, scrambled to seek out different options.
“We have been confronted with a call level and had to determine the place to print as a substitute,” Nash mentioned. “So we began in search of bids and making an attempt to determine how we have been going to proceed to offer print merchandise that individuals need.”
Not only a metro Denver drawback
CCM wasn’t alone. The Colorado Media Venture, a nonpartisan philanthropic initiative devoted to supporting and sustaining native information, surveyed publishers impacted by the Gannett press closure and located that one publication was compelled to shut. A number of others have been wrestling with whether or not to go digital-only, and at the very least three publishers of a number of papers opted to consolidate titles.
In October, The Colorado Solar reported that the findings of a working group on the way forward for printing in Colorado, revealed by the Colorado Press Affiliation, Colorado Information Collaborative and the Colorado Media Venture “underscored the blow of the Pueblo closure and highlighted the almost exhausted printing capability statewide and ‘unsustainable’ price will increase. The report voices concern that persevering with these trajectories may result in the demise of a ‘sizeable quantity’ of publications.”
Nash mentioned CCM finally selected to contract with The Denver Publish for printing, however didn’t contemplate it a long-term answer.
“Because the Nationwide Belief for Native Information bought Colorado Group Media in 2021, our printing prices have gone up 60%, which was clearly very vital for an operation of this measurement,” mentioned Nash, including that “we began having discussions round these bigger industrial printers closing and the truth that there aren’t very many choices within the Entrance Vary. So, we requested: what if we got here up with an choice. What would that appear like?”
NTLN started researching, speaking to funding companions, and placing collectively a plan to purchase a press.
“It’s heartening to suppose that we’ve a chance that helps us regulate our press prices higher and that we’ve an actual alternative to assist the media ecosystem in that means,” CCM Writer Linda Shapley mentioned.
Whereas the print newspaper and journal market has steadily declined because the mid-2000s, it’s nonetheless projected to earn $123.5 billion within the U.S. this 12 months. Many communities nonetheless lack dependable web entry, and a few individuals proceed to desire printed information, in line with Nash.
And getting a paper copy to commemorate an occasion remains to be significant for a lot of. Not too long ago, dad and mom whose youngsters have been featured in a bilingual publication devoted to Commerce Metropolis reached out to Shapley, asking if there have been printed copies accessible.
“You possibly can present the story in your cellphone or a pc, however it’s simply not the identical,” she mentioned.
On the identical time, CCM has centered on its digital transformation, relaunching its web sites final fall and introducing new newsletters. Shapley mentioned it’s vital to present individuals information in all of the codecs they need it.
“As a lot as individuals speak about how print goes away, the very fact of the matter is that it’s nonetheless right here, and it wants assist,” Shapley mentioned.
