Editorial

Welcome to the new 'concentrated' edition

Monday, July 1, 2013

When shopping in the soap aisle, you've probably noticed that manufacturers have begun decreasing package sizes in favor of concentrated versions of your favorite laundry detergent, fabric softener, or dish soap. There are a lot of benefits to the smaller packaging -- it cuts transportation costs, it reduces landfill, and it is easier for the consumer to haul into the laundry room.

Some of those same benefits can be applied to your newspaper.

When you opened tonight's paper, you may have thought that your arms had grown a few inches overnight. Before you get excited about how this new revelation will improve your rebounding skills on the noon basketball team, we have to burst your bubble and let you know that we have decreased our page size from 12.5 inches wide to 11 inches wide. The length has remained the same at 22 5/8 inches.

Next to payroll, our biggest expense is for newsprint. We cannot control the rising costs of many of our expenses like fuel, insurance, and utilities, so it becomes even more important for us to reduce the costs that we can control, like newsprint.

The trend to smaller newspaper sizes has been going on for decades. A 75th anniversary edition the Gazette published in 1957 measures 17" wide. A 1976 bicentennial edition measures 15" across. While we don't remember specifically when we switched to the 12.5" page size, most of the Gazette old timers believe it was more than 15 years ago.

A narrower size has been adopted by most metro newspapers as well as many community daily papers throughout Nebraska, including the Beatrice Daily Sun, Columbus Telegram, Fremont Tribune, Grand Island Independent, Kearney Hub, Lincoln Journal Star, North Platte Telegraph, Scottsbluff Star Herald, and York News Times.

To accommodate the smaller page size, our newsroom team has been tweaking the style guides we use to lay out each page. We left the font size the same as it has always been, but we have tightened up some of the vertical space between the lines. We will continue to fine-tune our page design to give our pages a crisp, clean, and uncluttered look.

What will not change is the news content. We will continue to provide coverage of McCook and area news, sports, and community events. We are dedicated to providing Southwest Nebraska and Northwest Kansas with a news product that keeps them informed about the important issues. The "concentrated" version of the newspaper will still carry the same load. We will continue to feature your friends, family, and neighbors on our pages. The only thing that has changed is the packaging.

We hope you find the narrower size to be more comfortable to handle and easier to take along with you, and the content to be concise and useful.

We urge you to call the Publisher Shary Skiles or Editor Bruce Crosby at (308) 345-4500 or 1 (800) 269-1426 and tell us how we can better serve you.

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