Dailies See Signs of Recovery
Break in bad business climate could open avenues for newspaper printing
Bill Esler, Editor in Chief -- Graphic Arts Online, October 16, 2009
Moveable type sculpture dresses up the New York Times headquarters
Early signs of a restructured U.S. newspaper business provide signs
of hope for recovery in the battered printing and publishing sector. While
publishing giants such as Gannett and McClatchy have closed printing facilities
and, in some cases, shuttered newspapers, indications indicate the tide may be
turningâgood news for printers who sell billions in printing services to the
nation's thousands of dailies and weeklies.
The recovery touches small newspapers, such as Claremont,
NH-based Eagle Times, which folded during the summer, but now says it will
resume printing. At the other end of the spectrum, the New York Times, with $2.9
billion in sales and 16 daily newspapers, says it will now take its Boston Globe off the block. After a
battle with unions over cost cutting and threats of closure, the Times has
found no buyers, but also 
Buffalo News Upgrades Color for Printing New York Times
identified a new strategy: development of regional editions.
As part of that effort, the Times announced it will create an
expanded twice-weekly regional edition for San Francisco. A similar move was announced
by the Wall St. Journal last month. The Times has also moved its regional
printing 
New York Times will keep publishing and printing the Boston Globe
contract on October 12 for Northeast U.S.
and Canadian editions from Transcontinental to The Buffalo (NY) News,
according to the Buffalo Business Journal,
which said the contact for 17,000 dailies and 30,000 Sunday copies required
nearly $1 million in upgrades for handling color.
McClatchy delivered a positive earnings report yesterday, with net income of $23.6 million on $347.4 million revenue for the newspaper printing and publishing firm. And Wall St. Journal reported yesterday that its circulation has risen slightly to 2.02 million, placing it ahead of Gannett's USA Todayâwith 1.9 million circulationâas the nation's largest circulation daily.
On the global newspaper front, the international IFRA 2009 newspaper publishing and printing trade show, which ended yesterday in Vienna, recorded 6,700 visitors from 78 countries.
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