Deadlines changing, some coverage to go digital first

Many industries are currently going through a labor shortage, and the newspaper industry is no exception. This has resulted in more and more demands being placed on fewer and fewer people within our company, and others. Additionally, more and more newspapers are publishing select content in a digital format first these days. Before they run it in print. And so we here at the Eagle Grove Eagle are making adjustments to keep up with the times.

 

One of the ways in which we're dealing with this challenge is to adjust our deadlines to reduce press stoppages. And also to give our staff – and the staff of our advertisers – more time to handle their increased workload.

 

Accordingly, our advertising order deadline is moving back one hour from noon, to 11:00 am on Fridays. But the deadline for the submission of content (such as press releases, letters to the editor, etc.) from the public remains the same, at noon on Fridays. And, because we know ours is not the only business impacted by this labor shortage, we're moving our deadline for final advertisement approval ahead by one business day, to Mondays. And since there's a weekend in there, that gives our advertisers three extra calendar days to check out and approve their ads.

 

Additionally, our internal news and editorial deadline is changing from Tuesday mornings, to Monday afternoons, at 2:30 pm. Due to this change, our editorial coverage will now run from Saturdays to Sundays, instead of Sundays to Mondays. Which will hopefully eliminate the need for any members of our team to work straight through the night on Mondays, as was often necessary at our reduced staffing levels to meet the old deadline.

 

And, in order to ensure readers of our reports on City Council and School Board meetings don't have to wait an extra week (because those meetings are typically scheduled on Monday evenings) we will start publishing those articles to our website first, typically the next night. And we will then republish them in the following week's print edition as well. Meaning these reports will typically be available for reading as much as a day earlier than they have been, for subscribers, on our website. Other Monday and weekend events may also be published online first, as well, depending upon circumstances.

 

In summary, our standard deadlines are changed as follows, effective immediately:

And City Council and School Board meeting reports will appear online the week of the meeting, and in print the week following.