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Extra, extra, read all about it:
Paper outsources ad work, ousts ad workers
By Doni Greenberg • May 6th, 2008 • Category: THOUGHT: What's on Doni's mind
Thanks to Jeff Gore for this Food for Thought forum news nugget he uncovered for us Tuesday about Redding’s only daily newspaper, and my former employer.
Jeff shared a trade-journal excerpt that reported the Record Searchlight’s ad production work will be handled by Express KCS - a company based in San Jose, described in part on its Web site as, “World class offshore advertising for newspapers.”
(Dear Express KFC - I mean KCS: In this case, “World class” is a compound modifier, so your sentence should read “World-class offshore . . .” You’re welcome. No problem.)
Sorry about that. I’m back now.
Although Express KCS is California-based, this snippet from its Web site clears things up regarding work-site locations:
“Express KCS uses our thirty-year heritage in high-end prepress and location in India to bring offshore graphic arts within reach of businesses worldwide. Our quality of service is the reason our clients include newspaper, magazines, prepress companies and agencies. Contact us to find out how you can benefit from local service at offshore rates.”
(Dear Express KCS - May I just call you EK? Me again. I realize you deal with newspapers, so surely you’re familiar with the Associated Press Stylebook, “The Journalist’s Bible.” It suggests figures for numbers 10 and above. For example, your thirty-year heritage” should read “30-year heritage” since 30 is higher than 10.
These are the kinds of errors that drive newspaper journalism folks crazy. Same thing with using “its” when you mean “it’s” and vice versa. Also, when you listed your client categories, your singular reference to “newspaper” should be plural. Might want to change that. )
Sorry for the interruption, everyone. Now where was I? Oh yes, RS newspaper ad production going to EK, which sends work to India.
What troubles me most about this Eky deal is many Record Searchlight human beings lost their jobs when their ad production projects went overseas. This is a lousy way to treat loyal employees, many of whom worked at the paper for decades as editors and publishers came and went.
I realize outsourcing means more money for corporate offices. I realize outsourcing means more money for companies like EK.
But tell me, how does outsourcing help our north state community? Who wins - besides the corporate bean-counters - when local, loyal employees are dumped because their jobs can be done more cheaply by workers on the other side of the world?
Here’s another EK quote, this time, about ads:
“Newspapers depend upon a smooth production operation for their livelihood. Advertisements are not a necessary evil, rather the life blood of both daily and weekly titles. However, the cost is high, when servicing ultra-local clients with individual demands, while turning round artwork on a dime. The risk of getting this wrong is higher, however, possibly meaning life or death to a publication.
Fortunately, Express KCS understand this, and have newspaper production knowledge in bucketloads. As India’s leading independent prepress company, we have the skills to carry out ad production, 24/7, from ad order to delivery of completed PDF. With logistics managed from your local office in the US or UK, we’ll work with you to make the process seamless.
We’ll also give you a business model that works for you, where you’re able to budget costs and see the savings going forward.”
EEEKK! Doni here. No offense, but you seriously need a copy editor. Quickly now, this is just my opinion, but your line - “… newspaper production knowledge in bucketloads” - is a total dog. Bucketloads of newspaper knowledge? It just doesn’t work.
And when you wrote, “Express KCS understand this,” it should say, “Express KCS understands this,” since your organization’s name is singular, demonstrated by your next sentence that begins, “As India’s leading independent prepress company …”
Plus, when you wrote,”… while turning round artwork on a dime,” did you truly mean round artwork? Change “round” to “around” - unless round artwork on a dime is what you actually meant.
My God. Don’t tell me you’ve got the United States Treasury contract, too!
Finally, my thoughts turn to north state advertisers (aka life blood, and ultra-local clients with individual demands), our friends and neighbors. Does anyone at the RS tell these “ultra-local clients with individual demands” when/if their local ads are outsourced ultra-elsewhere?
And what about the money the RS gains from its offshore savings?
Are those savings passed onto our local advertisers in the form of lower ad prices?
Just curious.
Hey, I don’t have the market cornered on questions. Check out the part of EK’s Web site that deals with newspaper for yourself.
Bring along a red pen. You’ll need it.
When will either the Sac Bee or another North State paper wake up and see that Redding and other communities would be better served if they created a special edition paper for us. The Bee could use their own paper but the local section would be dedicated to Redding, Chico and other communities thourghout the area. That way we in the North State would get a quality paper and just maybe then the Record Searchlight might finally pull its head from , well its ….
That was plain awful–and hysterical–and sad all at the same time.
I’m reminded of the devil speech in Broadcast News — where the Albert Brooks character (a serious journalist) tries, in vain, to warn star-struck Holly Hunter:
“What do you think the Devil is going to look like if he’s around? Nobody is going to be taken in if he has a long, red, pointy tail…..He will get a job where he influences a great God-fearing nation and he will never do an evil thing… he will just — bit by little bit — lower standards where they are important.”
The thing is, I don’t think that corporate bean-counters and upper management care about readers. I think their attitude is, “where else are they going to go?” I confess to being one of those people, way back in the mid-’90s, who was less than thrilled with the prospect of online print media. Now I believe that the Internet has clearly emerged as our only hope for a free press (and it saves trees!). Clearly, the decision-makers in the newspaper business have forgotten the importance of a free press to a free society. It’s easy to blame the countries offering cheap labor, mostly because they look and sound different from us (not that Doni was doing that, but many others have and do). But it is the greed of those who look and sound exactly like us that is gutting the American ecomony, and, specifically, the newspaper industry. Today it’s local ads, but I think we all know that it will not stop there.
(ps: please put down your red pen, Doni…I haven’t figured out how to work spellcheck on my submissions.)
Whole professions have been shipped to India. For example, Information Technology jobs as Systems Analysts and IT Project Managers have been lost to American experts. The results have not always been acceptable, as those of us who have sought technical support well know. Very often we cannot understand those Indian techies because of their heavy accent. And sometimes their ignorance of American business practices causes software disasters. However, their cheap labor seems to be all that counts with corporate officials. Outsourcing to developing nations is short-sighted, to say the least.
Doni
I so agree with your red pen - Unfortunately the RS has always had problems getting the stories straight - but it is now so bad that it is painful. I am not an editor, but I do know grammar, and the RS has slid down a very slippery slope into the mud pits at this point. I feel it is indicative of quality when your product has poor grammar, misspellings, etc. etc. Thank you for keeping us informed.
I feel very compassionate for my colleagues who will end up being the ‘winners’, the ones who did not get laid off during this winnowing of our department. Those who are left will be working overtime every week, if not every day, amid a crush of wasteful dialog to and fro, trying to communicate with people who just do not understand the nuance of American communication and advertising.
By the end of May, what was once a ten-person, award-winning team will be reduced to three, with no end in sight to the weekly deluge of mediocre products.
Being the first let go from that sweat-shop was the best move I ever made.
Ziggy and all those who’ve lost their jobs at the once award winning ad department to Indians are very infortunate. My condolence to them. It’s sad to see Paul Bodenhamer’s old paper slide down the tubes. If he was around he could show these rookies how to run a newspaper. Corporates, including radio and television, lose sight of the fact that it’s local, local and local that keep it going.
Outsourcing to India, China and Japan for 30-cents an hour is just losing it.
They’re digging their hole just deeper to going under.
Thank You Doni for this information. It’s a sad situation.
Kudos, Doni, for this timely exposé — AND the crack copy editing. Sad that this mass exodus of U.S. work is going on in every field. When profit is a business’s sole consideration, quality flies out the window — sometimes all the way to India.
Laissez-faire capitalism works great for the folks in power, but for the rest of us, not so well.