Last Tuesday night, I got a text from Melinda: “Check your email.” It was somewhat late, and I had a feeling something was up. Sure enough, when I opened my inbox, the subject line of the message confirmed it, “Another Printer to Bite The Dust.”
The email linked to a story from the Lubbock Avalanche-Journal. In short, the printing press in Lubbock, the same one that’s been producing The Albany News for years, will soon shut down. Their printing operations are being moved to Juarez, Mexico.
When I first considered buying The Albany News last fall, one of my main concerns was making sure we had a reliable printing solution in place. I did my homework. All signs pointed to Lubbock being a solid, long-term option. It had history. It had scale. It had experienced staff. But sometimes, even the surest bets can come up short. This news even caught the employees in Lubbock by surprise. They found out the same way I did, with little warning and even less time to react…