WDBJ7 Roanoke News and Weather NRV Lynchburg Danville | Headlines In Hard Times: How the Roanoke Times is weathering the storm (Parts 1 & 2)

Headlines In Hard Times: How the Roanoke Times is weathering the storm (Parts 1 & 2)

The Roanoke Times' Heidelberg Press is rolling, cranking out 56,000 copies an hour. The press room operators are "setting ink," grabbing copies as they come off the press, and scanning the pages to make sure the ink is flowing as it should.

"If something does go wrong, it gets past us in just the blink of an eye, so as quickly as they can check their pages, they're going to move over and get another copy and start the process all over again," said David Oalmann, press room operations manager.

Installed six years ago, the $31 million press brought a steep learning curve and plenty of adjustments since. But Oalmann believes it will serve the newspaper for decades to come.

"Do you foresee a day when we won't be producing, you know, a paper product, a newspaper here in Roanoke?," asked News7's Joe Dashiell.

"Well, I hope not in my lifetime. I think we're a ways off. I think there's going to be a demand for it, for a long, long time," said Oalmann.

The Roanoke Times has been printing newspapers for a long time, 123 years and counting.

The paper has seen major changes before, including the arrival of radio, and then television, the merger of the morning and afternoon editions, and integration of new printing technology.

Making sure there's a strong demand for the printed page in the future could be tricky.

"I wouldn't lie and say I don't worry about it sometimes," said Lindsey Nair, food writer.

Nair and other employees acknowledge the anxiety they've felt as other news organizations have struggled, and their own has cut back, but they also say they feel fortunate to be at The Roanoke Times.

"I think that we all worry because I really don't think anybody has a good idea of what things are going to be like 20 years from now. So there's a lot of uncertainty. On the other hand, there's a lot of excitement for me, because we do have new ways of delivering information to our readers now," said Nair.

The Roanoke Times has embraced the internet, and experimented with video and other digital media to serve its current customers in different ways, and reach out to a new audience.

"We can give you news whenever you want it, whichever way you want it. And we have to keep exploring that. We have to just be competitive because as I said if we're not there, somebody else will figure that out," said Carole Tarrant, editor of The Roanoke Times.

Like other news organizations across the country, the paper is also feeling the effects of internet competition.

"Do you also feel the pain from a Craigslist, for instance, that might be taking away some of your classified ads?," asked Dashiell.

"Oh definitely, we keep our eye on them very constantly," said Debbie Meade, publisher of The Roanoke Times.

And it hasn't found the business model on the web that will replace declining revenues on the print side.

"I think it's a real muddy picture right now. You don't have to look at many newspapers to figure out that we don't have that figured out yet," said Matt Chittum, reporter for The Roanoke Times.

At The Roanoke Times, paid circulation fell 11 percent from September 2008 to September 2009.

However, readership, how many people actually read the paper, was up during that same period, according to an independent research firm.

Managers make the case that The Roanoke Times is different from many of the newspapers that have struggled financially. They say the paper is profitable, debt-free and more like a community newspaper than a big metro daily.

"We strive each day to have stories on our front page that are strongly rooted to the Roanoke or New River Valley," said Roanoke Times Managing Editor Michael Stowe.

"And that's a great gift for a newspaper to feel like it is a community publication, people are tied to it," said Tarrant.

There are new niche publications.

"We've got our three community publications: The Botetourt View, So Salem, and SWOCO," said New Channels Editor Dwayne Yancey.

And a back to the future approach.

"If you go back and look at the newspapers we did in the 1950s, there is this sort of community news in it. At some point, we got away from that. Our community publications are getting back to that sort of journalism, but in sort of a very newfangled sort of way," said Yancey.

Yancey has done it all in 27 years at the paper. Jorge Valencia is a relative newcomer. He's been at the paper "for a year and some change," and covers overnight crime and community news.

"And that's why we're sitting here next to the police scanners," said Valencia.

Despite turmoil in the industry, he's confident he made the right career choice.

"I feel fortunate that I'm starting out now, because if I'm lucky I've got many years ahead of me, and I'll get to do this for a long time, and you know we're going to figure this out," said Valencia.

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2009 has been a tough year for newspapers across the country.  Dozens have gone out of business or pulled the plug on their print editions.

Thursday, we learned that the Associated Press laid off its only remaining employee in the region.

As the economy soured, and readers turned to other sources for news and information, we wanted to know how the Roanoke Times is doing.

From editors around a conference table, to a reporter working a beat, and a carrier making an early morning delivery, the Roanoke Times covers communities, tells their stories, manufactures tens of thousands of papers, and delivers them to readers' doorsteps every day.

But for this newspaper, and many others across the country, 2009 has not been business as usual.

"How would you describe the most recent numbers?," asked Joe Dashiell.  "In a word, bad.  The industry was off about ten percent," said Rick Edmonds, newspaper industry analyst. 

He follows newspaper circulation and other industry trends for the Poynter Institute, a journalism training and resource center in Florida.  In an internet interview, he told us the newspaper business hasn't turned the corner yet.

"If you're losing that much in one year, and that's on the heels of some other losses, it's concerning," said Edmonds.

In August, the Roanoke Times took the unusual step of printing a full-page "Letter from the Publisher."

"I don't know that a publisher here has ever communicated that way to readers, but we felt it was important to do that now given that so many people had asked us how we were doing given the lingering recession," said Debbie Meade, Roanoke Times publisher.

She outlined the steps the paper has taken to deal with a decline in advertising revenue.  Meade and her management team decided to freeze wages.  They asked employees to take five furlough days and cut unprofitable circulation.  They also eliminated 30 full-time positions, but the paper has avoided mass layoffs.

"I can tell you that particularly when it came to furlough days, that is unpaid days off that we asked our staff to take, that was a very difficult decision to make and we wouldn't have done it just to try and meet our original profit expectations. We did it so we could stay in a safety range of comfortable profitability," said Meade.

The newspaper's employees admit they've had some anxious moments over the last year.

"And we started hearing about layoffs at some of our sister properties and that felt like the earth moving," said Matt Chittum, Roanoke Times reporter.

He says he doesn't like that the staff is now smaller, or that circumstances required a re-design, but he also recognizes the consequences could have been worse.

"I didn't like taking furlough days, but I like that we've come through this to date anyway, without anybody losing their job involuntarily, and continuing to put a paper out every day, that's pretty daggone good," said Chittum. 

We surveyed 500 adults who live in the areas that the Roanoke Times serves. In a News7 SurveyUSA poll conducted last week, more than three quarters said they think a local daily newspaper is essential to their communities.

But fewer than half said they actually subscribe, read the newspaper almost every day, or have ever visited the paper's website.

Despite those challenges, and concern in the community, Meade says the Roanoke Times isn't going anywhere.

"We're staying right here.  This is a good business and if we run it efficiently, it will be an excellent business for a long time to come," said Meade.

"Do you think those people believe you when you tell them that?," asked Dashiell.

"I hope they do.  I think we have really shown over time that we have real staying power," said Meade.

Another source of uncertainty was the fact the paper was up for sale this year, until the troubles on Wall Street brought negotiations to a halt.  Meade says it's possible the newspaper will be back on the market, but probably not for several years until the economy has recovered.