Brighter Alternatives

Across the U.S. last week, newspapers indulged in strange acts of self-denial. The Salt Lake City Tribune told its advertisers to buy less space. The Los Angeles Times cut back the number of home delivery samples it sends to nonsubscribers, while both the Phoenix (Ariz.) Gazette and Arizona Republic dropped their first editions. The Westerly (R.I.) Sun ran a survey asking readers which features in the paper they would prefer to see omitted.

Behind such odd behavior lay a sudden, pinching shortage of newsprint, the rough, lightweight paper that is daily journalism's staff of life. Around 65% of the newsprint consumed in the U.S. comes from Canada, where a nationwide rail strike last week brought major deliveries to the U.S. to a halt. That only dramatized older problems. A wet spring hampered logging operations this year, and summer strikes at many of Canada's major paper mills have reduced production from 28,000 to 22,000 tons daily.

Even the immediate settlement of the mill strikes (which does not seem likely) will not avert a shortage that may continue for three years. The problem is that while production of newsprint has remained about the same since 1970, demand has risen steadily. U.S. papers gobbled up 10.3 million tons of newsprint last year, an increase from 9.6 million tons in 1970; consumption for the first six months this year ran 5.4% higher than the 1972 rate. Caught flat-footed by this surge, neither U.S. purchasers nor Canadian suppliers see any quick solution. New paper mills are costly ($50 million to $100 million each) and take two to four years to build; many Canadian mills are reluctant to risk such huge investments on the relatively low profit margins (5% this year) earned by cheap newsprint.

Newspapers large and small are feeling the squeeze: last week the Wall Street Journal announced "a painful step," told readers it was reducing news, editorial and ad space and skimping on newsstand copies. Weeklies and smaller dailies that have no private mills, no huge standing orders with suppliers and no capacity to stockpile large quantities of newsprint were taking even more drastic steps. Some--like the Rapid City (S. Dak.) Journal--have already stopped publishing Saturday editions to conserve dwindling paper supplies.

Fact of Life. Other papers have continued to print all editions but have reduced out-of-state circulation or cut the number of copies distributed to newsstands, where unsold papers now seem a vanishing luxury. Other economies are being sought. The Martinsburg (W. Va.) Journal has compressed its editorial and comic sections down to half a page; the Hillsboro (Ore.) Argus has trimmed its obituary columns by leaving out the names of pallbearers. Seeking a brighter alternative, the Charleston (W. Va.) Sunday Gazette-Mail dipped into a reserve stock of tinted newsprint and ran off an edition splashed with pink, green and yellow.

As they recognize the newsprint shortage as a fact of future life, some newspapermen are concluding that economizing on paper may have its beneficial side. St. Petersburg Times Editor Eugene Patterson has cut back news columns by 35% and told staffers to think up ways in which stories can be fully told in less space. Says Patterson: "It's a good time to look at the paper and clean out some of the deadwood we've been printing, if that's what it is."

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