BtoB Media Business - November 2012 - (Page 23)

Production Five-day debate Possibility of USPS eliminating Saturday delivery has publishers seeking alternatives according to Bernie Schraml, director he U.S. Postal Service loses billions of of manufacturing and distribution for dollars every quarter and hit its $15 Bloomberg Businessweek. Its first test was in billion borrowing limit from Congress Philadelphia, and the project has been for the first time this year. Postmaster General expanded to 23 markets. Next year, John Potter has been saying for years that one Bloomberg Businessweek will add another way for the struggling organization to save a printing plant to the three that already whole lot of money is to deliver mail only five produce the title. That “will reduce transdays a week. To some, this is blasphemy. Yet portation time to subscribers in the southeast in today’s economy, it seems inevitable. area of the country,” Schraml said. It would require approval from Congress All of this effort is because the company is to trim delivery by one day a week, and that concerned that about 35% of its mailed sublegislative body hasn’t yet seemed to be scriber copies wouldn’t make it to their destiinterested in saving all that cash for reasons nation until Monday if Saturday delivery is unknown. dropped. “Expanding the use of hand delivStill, weekly b-to-b ery to provide guaranmagazines have been teed Friday or Saturday nervously waiting for delivery to subscribers that day to arrive, and is how our magazine will one suspects that after mitigate the effect of the presidential election, a reduction in postal things might change— service,” Schraml said. especially since the top Bloomberg Businessissue in this year’s elecweek continues to look tion is the state of the for delivery partners in U.S. economy. the markets where it Jo Arnone, director of production, “Honestly, USPS serdoesn’t have one yet Editorial Projects in Education vice is presently so and will continue to unreliable and unpredictable in terms of attempt to improve its process in order to days to the box, I wonder if it will have speed delivery. much noticeable impact,” said Jo Arnone, One issue in the five-day delivery scenario director of production at Editorial Projects that will need to be worked out is how two in Education. “It will give another leg-up to mail programs that were created to help alternate delivery services such as UPS and save publishers money—co-palletization and FedEx, and perhaps spawn new service co-mailing—will fit into the equation, said providers capable of filling the gap for Jim Pizzo, senior director of distribution, those to whom Saturday delivery is essential,” paper and production finance at UBM. she said. “It’s easy to suggest that publishers revise Jack Widener, American Business Media’s their production cycle schedules with their postal counsel, said the association has printers who mail-prepare their publicaresearched options for alternate delivery to tions,” he said. “But with so much emphasis USPS extensively and continues to monitor on co-mail or co-pal today to optimize USPS those services as an alternative for members savings, it may not be so easy with other that require Saturday delivery. publishers’ periodicals at the same facility.” One title that has been extremely Still, Widener said that when Congress proactive in seeking alternate forms of finally gets around to accepting five-day delivery is Bloomberg Businessweek. delivery it will likely take six months to Since December 2010, the title has been a year before the sixth day is actually expanding its use of hand delivery of eliminated in order to give everyone ample magazines using nonpostal delivery partners, time to prepare. BY MARK J. MILLER PRESSING ISSUES PRODUCTION T “Honestly, USPS service is presently so unreliable and unpredictable in terms of days to the box, I wonder if it will have much noticeable impact.” ryan Crowe, production manager for Allured Business Media, works in a department with three designers, a design manager and a developer producing four monthly b-to-b titles. The team also lays out books, supports both marketing efforts and events, and is in the process of optimizing its sites BRYAN for mobile devices. CROWE, Media Business: Production manager, What are the biggest issues facing your pro- Allured Business duction department Media right now? Bryan Crowe: Technology: Utilizing mobile devices (tablets, smartphones); the transition from print to digital; and the manner in which best to accomplish this. Technology is a moving target, and the face of publishing is changing on a daily basis. Just go to any store and see how the magazine racks are shrinking smaller and smaller. By the time print hits the rack, it’s practically outdated information. “Readers” are now becoming quickly known as “users.” They want it now, and they don’t want to wait for a magazine to show up in the mail. MB: What issue is out there industrywide that particularly concerns you? Crowe: With more and more people moving to tablets, I read recently that even laptop manufacturers are beginning to have trouble selling. People are quickly adopting the tablets and smartphones. The tablet market is booming and will only grow bigger. The demand to deliver content to those devices is exploding— interactive, up-to-date, relevant content. Right now, that is through apps and HTML5. Tomorrow it may be —M.J.M. something different. Mobile, tablet compatibility needs at the forefront B mediabusinessonline.com | November 2012 | Media Business | 23 http://www.mediabusinessonline.com

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of BtoB Media Business - November 2012

BtoB Media Business - November 2012
Table of Contents
Upfront
ABM Executive Forum
Resource Guide
Sales & Marketing
M&A
Production
People
Benchmarks
Endnote

BtoB Media Business - November 2012