The newspaper you are holding this week was printed in Greensboro.
Watchman Media Group, publisher of the Greensboro Watchman, the Times-Standard-Herald, and the Western Star, has acquired a digital production press and is once again printing its newspapers in house, a return to a tradition that stretches back to the earliest days of the papers’ history.
The Times-Standard-Herald has not come off a local press since the Centreville Press closed its print shop years ago. The Watchman has not printed on its own press since before current editor and publisher John Allan Clark took the reins in 2018.
Readers will notice the difference immediately. The papers have moved from the familiar broadsheet format to a compact tabloid size, and for the first time, the pages can carry full color. Color printing has not appeared in the Times-Standard-Herald for years. The Watchman has never been printed in color in its history, until now.
“I know some folks will miss the big pages, and I understand that,” Clark said. “But as the man who pioneered this system told me, ‘I’d rather save a newspaper than save a format.’ He’s right.”
Change in how the news gets to paper is nothing new for these publications or the industry.
The earliest editions were printed on high textile content “rag” paper that still looks as bright today as the day it ran. Later came innovations in letterpress, including the Mergenthaler Linotype and web presses, and eventually the “cold” type and offset web printing most people picture when they think of a newspaper plant. Each of those changes drew skeptics in its day, but each one kept the presses rolling.
Today, the offset web presses that print most small newspapers are aging, parts are increasingly hard to find, and the people who know how to maintain, repair, and operate them are harder to find still. Meanwhile, the costs of printing, paper, fuel, and postage continue to climb.
Printing in house lets the papers run exactly the number of copies needed each week, saving paper and money even as belts tighten across the industry. It also makes the operation more nimble, able to adjust deadlines, page counts, and special editions without waiting on an outside plant’s schedule.
The new press also brings back a service many in Hale and Perry counties remember. Commercial printing, once a mainstay of the Watchman office, is available again through the company’s printing operation based in Greensboro. Customers who were accustomed to calling on the Watchman for custom print work before the old press room closed can do so once more.
“This press is an investment in these papers being here for the long haul,” Clark said. “We have a lot of ideas for special publications, partnerships, and other ways to put it to work for our communities. The format is changing, but our mission is not.”
